The invitation-only leadership network of Alpha Institute

Govern AI with peers who carry the same accountability.

Alpha Council is the invitation-only leadership network of Alpha Institute for board directors and senior executives accountable for how AI is governed, deployed, and converted into enterprise value.

Request membership considerationExplore the member experience
Alpha Council members gathered for a private Council dinner.
Alpha Council · Private member gathering
Membership
Invitation-only
Conversation
Chatham House Rule
Leadership
Board and C-suite
Reach
Global
Request consideration
Menu

The responsibility

The decisions are already on the agenda.

AI is moving from software people use to systems that act.

Boards and management teams must determine authority, evidence, value, risk, and human-intervention requirements while practice is still forming.

Accountability is not.

  1. See sooner

    Understand the governance implications of new capabilities, rules, market practice, and institutional expectations before they become urgent.

  2. Think with peers

    Compare judgment with leaders who face the same questions of authority, evidence, value, risk, and intervention.

  3. Decide with evidence

    Return to the boardroom with sharper questions, relevant practice, and a defensible basis for action.

The member experience

A working membership for consequential decisions.

Membership is built around recurring work, not passive access. Members bring live questions, compare practice, and contribute experience that makes the room useful.

  1. Independent Intelligence

    Decision-grade briefings on what changed, what matters now, and what leaders should ask next.

  2. Peer Judgment

    Private deliberation with directors and executives who carry comparable authority and consequence.

  3. Boardroom Action

    Questions, benchmarks, and practical resources built to travel into board, committee, and leadership meetings.

  4. Standard-Setting Influence

    Practitioner experience that can inform the Institute's research agenda without determining Alpha's independent judgment.

Specialized councils

Peer communities organized around defined mandates.

Alpha Council brings leaders together across functions. Specialized Agentic Councils support standing peer work in the areas where members hold direct accountability.

PlannedSpecialized Council

Board Composition, Accountability & Effectiveness

Agentic Governance Council

Building boards fit to govern the agentic enterprise.
Governing question
Who is accountable, what does the board oversee, and how is authority allocated?
Who participates
Board chairs, lead independent directors, nominating and governance committee leaders, corporate secretaries, general counsel, and governance executives.
Relationship to Alpha Council
A mandate-based peer community within Alpha Council. Time-bound working groups may develop defined resources for the broader Council and Institute.

Core agenda

  • Board composition and AI capability
  • Committee architecture and charters
  • Director, committee-chair, and CEO succession
  • Decision rights and agent accountability
  • Board effectiveness, information rights, and disclosure

Public launch timing and leadership have not been announced.

The signature ritual

The Alpha Council Table.

A recurring protocol for moving from a consequential signal to a decision a leader can defend.

  1. What changed

    Start with the signal.

    Alpha opens with a concise briefing on what changed and why it matters to boards and leadership teams.

  2. Your question

    Bring a real decision.

    A member brings an important question about governance, deployment, growth, controls, disclosure, risk, or workforce.

  3. Peer perspective

    Hear the challenge.

    Members question assumptions, compare experience, identify missing evidence, and consider what may happen next.

  4. Next steps

    Leave with a clearer path.

    Members leave with better questions, useful peer context, and practical next steps for the boardroom.

What evidence should management provide before an agent is authorized to act autonomously?

The Council year

A full year of working sessions.

Twelve months of private sessions, mandate-specific rooms, regional convenings, and continued connection between meetings.

  1. Monthly

    Alpha Council Sessions

    A current intelligence briefing, a live member case, peer deliberation, and boardroom action.

  2. Focused

    Specialized Council sessions

    Smaller conversations for members with shared responsibilities in Audit, Growth, and future Council communities.

  3. Regional

    Board Forums and Council Dinners

    Small, invitation-only gatherings in key boardroom and market centers.

  4. Annual

    Alpha Council Convening

    A private gathering to review the year, examine emerging governance questions, and establish priorities for the year ahead.

  5. Always available

    Private member environment

    Secure member access to the Council directory and the information made available for Council participation.

Alpha Institute

The Council is the Institute's private leadership network.

Research, standards, education, and convening meet practitioner judgment through a governed institutional architecture.

InstitutionAlpha Institute

Research, standards, education, and convenings.

Leadership networkAlpha Council

The private cross-functional room.

Mandate communitiesSpecialized Agentic Councils

Standing peer communities for defined accountabilities.

Defined outputsWorking Groups

Time-bound teams that create a benchmark, framework, paper, or board resource.

Alpha Evals and Alpha Platform are separate Alpha activities with appropriate independence, analytical, permission, and conflict-management controls.

The Membership Standard

Accountability is the qualification.

The Council is designed for leaders who carry a real mandate and contribute to the judgment of the room.

  1. Mandate

    You are directly responsible for important decisions about how AI is governed, built, deployed, or used.

  2. Experience

    You bring experience that can help other members see a decision more clearly.

  3. Contribution

    You are willing to share what you have learned, ask good questions, and challenge ideas with respect.

  4. Commitment

    You have time to take part in Council conversations and gatherings.

  5. Trust

    You protect confidentiality, disclose conflicts, and keep the Council free from solicitation.

Who joins

  • Board chairs, lead independent directors, and committee leaders
  • Chief executives and senior operating leaders
  • Leaders accountable for audit, risk, growth, technology, and workforce
  • Institutional, regulatory, technical, and research leaders with relevant judgment
No selling in the room. No pay-to-play. No sponsored conclusions. Conflicts are disclosed and managed.

Alpha Council members

Some of the leaders in the room.

The public directory includes members who have chosen to share their profiles. It does not represent the full membership.

Portrait of Maryam Banikarim, Board Director, Convener, C-suite Executive

Maryam Banikarim

Board Director, Convener, C-suite Executive

OneSpaWorld / MaryamB

View profile
Portrait of Jeff Berman, Chief Executive Officer, WaitWhat

Jeff Berman

Chief Executive Officer, WaitWhat

Board and operating leadership

View profile
Portrait of Gina Bianchini, Founder & CEO, Mighty Networks

Gina Bianchini

Founder & CEO, Mighty Networks

TEGNA board director

View profile
Portrait of Laura Desmond, Chief Executive Officer, Smartly

Laura Desmond

Chief Executive Officer, Smartly

Smartly, Adobe, DoubleVerify & women's sports investor

View profile
Portrait of David Eun, Former President and Chief Innovation Officer, Samsung Electronics

David Eun

Former President and Chief Innovation Officer, Samsung Electronics

Howard Hughes Holdings and Versant board director

View profile
Portrait of Carolyn Everson, Senior Advisor, Permira & Board Director

Carolyn Everson

Senior Advisor, Permira & Board Director

The Coca-Cola Company, The Walt Disney Company, Under Armour & Permira

View profile
View the public member directory
“When you have a governance question before a board meeting, you need peers who have faced it.”

Pam KaufmanBoard Director, Lindblad Expeditions Holdings, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation, and Stella McCartney Ltd.

  • Adobe
  • Bank of America
  • BNY
  • IBM
  • Lindblad Expeditions
  • Lucid
  • Nasdaq
  • Nokia
  • Rock & Roll Hall of Fame
  • Stella McCartney
  • Sunrun
  • Western Union
Organizations are shown solely to describe the current and prior affiliations of individual members. Their appearance does not imply organizational membership, sponsorship, endorsement, or participation in Alpha Evals.

Membership process

Selective review. Personal participation.

Public consideration starts a private review. Payment and activation occur only after an invitation.

  1. 1

    Request consideration

    Share your role, the AI decisions you are responsible for, and what you would bring to the Council.

  2. 2

    Confidential fit conversation

    If the Council may be right for you, the Secretariat will invite you to a private conversation about your work and interests.

  3. 3

    Review and matching

    Together, we consider where your experience and responsibilities would be most useful.

  4. 4

    Private invitation

    If it feels like a strong match on both sides, you will receive a private invitation to join.

  5. 5

    Activation

    Your private invitation includes membership terms and a secure link to complete your membership.

Membership investment

Individual accountability. Active participation.

Every participant is independently reviewed and invited. Individual seats are non-transferable. Enterprise membership provides multiple named seats and does not create organizational control over Council activity.

Individual

Individual Membership

One named member seat · By invitation

Enterprise

Enterprise Membership

Multiple named seats across relevant leadership mandates · By invitation

Institutional independence

Membership does not buy influence.

Alpha Council participation may inform the Institute's research agenda and public educational work. It does not determine Alpha Evals methodologies, analytical opinions, assessments, surveillance, or rating decisions.

  • Does not confer or imply an Alpha Rating
  • Does not influence a rating outcome or assessment finding
  • Does not provide preferential analytical treatment
  • Does not create an institutional endorsement
  • Does not give members control over evals methodology
  • Does not permit commercial solicitation inside Council sessions

Alpha maintains separate governance, analytical, and conflict-management controls for Institute, Council, Evals, and commercial activities.

Alpha Council

The trusted room for leaders accountable for AI.

Request membership consideration

Membership by invitation · Updated 7 August 2026