What is AI governance?
Also known as: AI oversight, artificial intelligence governance
AI governance is the set of practices, policies, and controls an organization uses to keep its AI systems, from assistants and agents to the models behind them, safe, accountable, and compliant. It spans inventory, ownership, risk classification, access control, and evidence, applied across every AI tool in use rather than a single vendor. Good AI governance makes AI adoption auditable instead of a growing blind spot.
AI governance is not a single tool or policy. It is the discipline of making AI adoption something an organization can see, control, and stand behind, the same way it governs identity or data.
Crucially, it is vendor-neutral. Teams run Microsoft Copilot next to OpenAI, Gemini, Claude, and in-house agents, so governance that covers only one vendor leaves most of the risk unmanaged. Effective AI governance applies one model, inventory, ownership, risk, access, and evidence, across the whole AI stack.
