Lila Ibrahim holds the title Chief AI Readiness Officer at Google DeepMind. She might be the only person on Earth with that title. Not because the role is so specialized. Because nobody else needed to make one up.
Google DeepMind created a C-suite position for preparing for AI risks. The same company building the AI created a job to prepare for the AI. That's like hiring a Chief Arson Preparedness Officer who reports directly to the arsonist.
Ibrahim takes the role very seriously as intelligence risks rise. She's paid to worry about the thing her employer is actively accelerating. It's a perfect closed loop. Google builds increasingly powerful AI systems while employing someone whose entire job is looking concerned about it in meetings.
The readiness officer framework is brilliant. You get to claim you're being responsible without slowing down for a single f*cking second. Ibrahim can stand at conferences and talk about guardrails while the engineers three floors down are teaching language models to write code that could replace her entire department.
What does AI readiness even mean? Preparing for what's to come sounds like something a motivational speaker says before selling you a webinar. It's the corporate equivalent of thoughts and prayers. We're ready for the risks. We've appointed someone. She has business cards.
The best part is how seriously everyone pretends this matters. Tech journalists write profiles. Ibrahim gives interviews about the importance of preparation. And Google keeps shipping models faster than any readiness officer could possibly assess them. But sure, the title exists, so we're covered.
Somewhere a retail trader is reading this headline and thinking it's a bullish signal for Alphabet stock because it shows corporate responsibility.
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