IBM report finds AI governance lagging behind business enthusiasm

Businesses are increasingly eager to expand their use of artificial intelligence, but a new IBM report suggests governance is not keeping pace. The report surveyed more than 3,000 business leaders across Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

Four in five respondents (80%) said an AI-related incident had reached their board or C-suite in the past year. Examples included an agent failure, data exposure, an AI-driven decision error or an AI security breach. Yet fewer than half (40%) said their organization would change its AI governance policy or framework in response.

Three-quarters (75%) expect AI agents to have some autonomy in decision-making by 2027, while only 37% believe their governance is designed to scale with agentic AI deployment. Nearly all respondents (98%) said responsibility for AI risk had been formally assigned at board level; 26% reported having a dedicated board-level AI committee.

Views on legal liability remain split. Respondents cited formal legal or contractual frameworks for vendor liability in agent failures (33%), defined thresholds for human escalation (32%), real-time monitoring and audit trails of agent decisions and actions (30%), and the ability to immediately halt agent activity across the enterprise (29%) as governance measures.

IBM Senior Vice President and Chair, EMEA and APAC, Ana Paula Assis said the debate had shifted from AI adoption to governance and accountability. She said governance should be built into how agents operate, with clear boundaries, ownership and real-time controls.