Dr Kate Barker advises boards and senior executives on the practical governance of AI. She works with companies that are past the proof-of-concept and now face the harder question: who is accountable when intelligence is distributed?
Asked across boardrooms, executive retreats, and the occasional government brief. The shape of the work, in the words people actually use.
Reach out about something not on this list.
Write to mehow to compose a board for the AI era
whether to appoint a tech director (and when not to)
when to retire an AI committee
what to put in a board pre-read for AI risk
how to brief a CEO who knows less than the room
whether trust is actually a board-level metric
why succession planning has stopped working
when to disagree with your chair in public
The question is not whether AI changes the work. It is who in the room is accountable for that change.
KATE BARKEREqual weight, no hierarchy. Pick the doorway that fits the week you are having.
Strategic keynotes on leadership, artificial intelligence, trust, and the future of work in an age of accelerating technological change. Each one challenges leaders to rethink how organisations make decisions, build trust, and develop talent as intelligent systems reshape the global economy.
GLOBAL KEYNOTES Explore Keynote SpeakingSenior counsel to chairs, board members, and executive committees where decisions carry material consequence for strategy, risk, leadership, and public trust. Confidential, agenda-led work that strengthens board judgement, decision quality, and oversight in periods of transition and heightened scrutiny.
RETAINED COUNSEL Explore Board AdvisoryA high-trust, confidential partnership for senior leaders navigating complexity, board transitions, succession, transformation, or expanded influence. Space for sharper judgement and more deliberate action, shaped around the realities of leadership at the top. By invitation or referral.
PRIVATE PROGRAMMES Explore Executive CoachingWork with boards, CEOs, and executive committees navigating complexity, transformation, and institutional risk at scale. Enterprise-level challenges across leadership, governance, workforce capability, and technology-enabled transformation. Selective engagements, anchored to decision quality rather than methodology alone.
ENTERPRISE-SCALE ENGAGEMENTS Explore Strategic ConsultingBoards, governments, and operators across sovereign, corporate, and academic systems. The work travels.
Dr Kate Barker advises boards, governments, and senior executives navigating decisions that carry long-term institutional, economic, and societal consequences.
I ntelligence is now the cheap resource. Trust is the scarce one. The Hidden Power is a working theory of how organisations accumulate and lose relationship capital, told through six case studies and a quiet argument with the assumption that AI is mostly a technology problem.
A handful each year, worked on across months. Mostly on governance, trust, and what AI is doing to leadership.
On the slow, embarrassing death of the AI sub-committee, and what should replace it before the next board cycle.
Why workforce planning has stopped working for the organisations that can least afford it.
A working draft of a metric boards keep asking for and analysts keep pretending exists.
A short FAQ. For longer conversations, please write directly.
Forty-five minutes. Confidential. Every enquiry read personally.
