What is the purpose of an AI Steering Committee?

• A. Provides strategic oversight, ensures alignment with organizational goals, and resolves major issues throughout the AI project life cycle.
• B. Writes code and deploys AI models.
• C. Markets the AI product to customers.
• D. Audits external vendors' compliance only.

Answer: (A)

An AI Steering Committee provides strategic governance for AI initiatives, ensuring they stay aligned with organizational goals, priorities, and risk tolerance. It guides major decisions across the AI project life cycle, including setting direction, approving budgets and resources, and resolving escalated issues. The committee also oversees data governance, ethics, privacy, security, and regulatory considerations, ensuring that deployments align with both business objectives and risk management expectations. This broad oversight helps coordinate stakeholders, manage dependencies, and monitor progress from ideation through deployment and operation.

These functions go beyond hands-on work like writing code or deploying models, and they’re broader than marketing or narrowly auditing vendors. The steering committee exists to ensure the AI program remains strategically focused, compliant, and well-governed across its entire lifecycle.