Companies struggle to balance fast AI adoption with ethical and reputational risks. Recent hacks by Anthropic and OpenAI agents exposed gaps in corporate governance. IBM found 80% of EMEA executives escalated AI incidents to leadership in the past year. Only 40% updated governance policies after such incidents. Just 37% have governance designed to scale with agentic AI. Randstad notes the main challenge is the speed and volume of AI change. Accenture says governance must balance control, democratisation and innovation. Okta suggests treating AI agents as first-class identities under the EU AI Act. Ikea sets AI principles including no surveillance and human oversight for high-stakes decisions. Salesforce updates AI guidance regularly as risks evolve. JLL classifies AI activities by risk level. A Wharton study found no consensus on who is responsible for AI errors. Demand for AI governance skills outpaces supply.

• 80% of EMEA executives reported AI incidents to board or C-suite
• 40% changed AI governance policy after incidents
• 37% have governance scaling with agentic AI
• 28% hold governance/risk team responsible for AI errors