The Framework
The Vela Board Navigator℠ gives directors a structured view of AI oversight across four quadrants and 16 elements - helping boards assess readiness, identify priorities, and make more informed, defensible decisions.
Where AI changes the business model and sources of value, what it is worth, and when to scale or stop.
Who is accountable for AI, what reaches the board, and whether its decisions can be explained.
Whether data, models, agents and vendors are governed, tested and secure as they change.
How AI affects the workforce, customers and wider community, and how harm is put right.
Each element asks what the board can show, not how confident it feels. Directors rate where each one stands, from absent to evidenced.
For each element, ask what the board could show today.
Weight the quadrants by how much the business depends on AI.
Agree the board’s top three priorities and record what it reviewed.
Start with the five-question assessment, or work through all 16 elements with a Vela founder.