AI Leadership··3 min read
Hiring Your First AI Leader: What to Look For
The candidate who impresses in the interview is often the wrong one. Here is what actually predicts success in the first AI seat.
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The JournalEssays & Field Notes
Practical writing on AI in the wild.
Field notes from real engagements. Frameworks, postmortems, and the unglamorous discipline of shipping AI in production.
Tagged: Hiring
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Fractional Leadership··3 min read
Fractional vs Interim Executive: Not the Same Hire
One is a permanent part-time seat. The other is a full-time bridge. Hiring the wrong one wastes a quarter.
Read essayFractional Leadership··4 min read
How to Hire a Fractional Executive Without Regretting It
The engagements that fail were almost always scoped by hours instead of decisions. Here is how to structure one that works.
Read essayAI Leadership··4 min read
Does My Company Actually Need a Chief AI Officer?
Most companies asking this question do not need a full-time AI executive. Here is the test that tells you which of the three answers applies.
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The Chief AI Officer Job Description, Written Honestly
Most Chief AI Officer job descriptions are a wish list assembled from three other roles. Here is what the seat is genuinely accountable for.
Read essayAI Leadership··5 min read
Chief AI Officer Salary in 2026: What the Role Really Costs
A full-time Chief AI Officer now costs $300K to $550K+ all-in. Here's the 2026 salary picture by company size, what drives it, and the math on the fractional alternative for companies that need the leadership without the payroll line.
Read essayFractional Leadership··6 min read
Fractional CAIO vs. AI Consultant vs. Full-Time Hire
There are three real ways to get senior AI leadership into a company, and they solve genuinely different problems. Here's an honest comparison of what each one costs, what it gets you, and how to tell which one you actually need.
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Common questions
- What does this blog cover?
- AI strategy and leadership decisions for growing businesses: what a Chief AI Officer actually does, how to evaluate vendors, how to measure return, and why most AI projects fail. It is written for people deciding what to fund, not for people building models.
- How often is it updated?
- New pieces publish regularly, and existing ones are revised when the underlying facts change — pricing, market rates and vendor landscapes move quickly enough that stale posts become misleading rather than merely dated.
- Who writes it?
- Erin Moore, a fractional Chief AI Officer and U.S. Army veteran with an Executive MBA, an MS in Data Science and a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt. Everything is written from the buyer's side of the table, which is where the work happens.
- Where should I start?
- If you are new to the topic, start with what a fractional Chief AI Officer does and why most AI projects fail. If you are already spending on AI, the posts on AI audits and measuring ROI will be more immediately useful.