The vacuum is least visible from the top
Two percent of CEO-seat respondents report an AI decision nobody owns. Fifteen percent of the finance seat does, and 30 percent of the technology seat. The board hears from the CEO. The gap is largest where the board does not look, and largest of all in platform companies, where half report no single owner.
The payback number in the deck is the CEO's
Seventy percent of the CEO seat expects return inside six months. The finance seat's most common answer is six to twelve months, at 46 percent. A board that accepts the six-month figure without asking the CFO for the date is accepting the most optimistic seat's number as the company's.
The security line
Two thirds of security leaders name agent access as their top problem and a third have a budget line for it; at the security seat itself, 24 percent. The Security Funding Gap is a number a board can request instead of a threat list.
The outside frame
BCG finds 61 percent of CEOs think their boards are moving faster than readiness supports, and three quarters of directors confident in their own AI understanding. Read against the operator data, the board is the most optimistic seat in a chain that runs downhill to the CTO.
What it means for the director
Ask the ownership question of the CTO and the CFO, not only the CEO. Ask for the CFO's date and the named metric. Ask for the Security Funding Gap as a number. And ask which of the four funding archetypes the company is.
Who should read it
Who should read it: Directors of public and late-stage companies, audit and risk committee chairs, and the CEOs and general counsel preparing for their questions.
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Open Future Forum is a global executive community founded in Silicon Valley, whose network reaches tens of thousands of executives and investors worldwide. Its research program, including the Executive AI Leverage Report and the role editions of the Enterprise AI Buying and Budget Index, is built on first-party survey data from executives attending Open Future Forum events.