{"id":230229,"date":"2026-04-01T23:49:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T03:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/01\/in-the-age-of-ai-why-do-australian-company-boards-have-so-few-technology-experts\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T00:05:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T04:05:11","slug":"in-the-age-of-ai-why-do-australian-company-boards-have-so-few-technology-experts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/01\/in-the-age-of-ai-why-do-australian-company-boards-have-so-few-technology-experts\/","title":{"rendered":"In the age of AI, why do Australian company boards have so few technology experts?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the age of AI, why do Australian company boards have so few technology experts?<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/theconversation.com\/in-the-age-of-ai-why-do-australian-company-boards-have-so-few-technology-experts-279752<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-04-01 23:49:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: theconversation.com<\/a><\/p>\n

The global economy is undergoing major transformation as artificial intelligence (AI) filters into almost every industry \u2013 reshaping business models and investment decisions. <\/p>\n

For those who sit on a company\u2019s board, setting overall strategy and holding management to account, the shift is raising the bar on what\u2019s required. Board members need to understand the new technology they\u2019re investing in. They must also be equipped to oversee complex technological risks. <\/p>\n

Given this, you\u2019d expect to see large companies stacking their boards with directors who have science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) expertise. But that isn\u2019t the case.<\/p>\n

Our new research shows that at the largest 500 listed companies in Australia, many boards lack members with sufficient technological expertise. More than half had no directors with STEM expertise on their board. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s why that\u2019s a problem \u2013 and why all of us have a stake in fixing it.<\/p>\n

What we found<\/h2>\n

We examined the backgrounds and expertise of directors from the largest 500 firms listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) and compared board composition in 2007 to 2022.<\/p>\n

We were interested in whether the number of directors with STEM expertise had increased to match the significant technological advancements that had taken place over that time. <\/p>\n

We were surprised by the results.<\/p>\n

We found the backgrounds and expertise of directors from Australia\u2019s largest firms changed very little over 15 years. Directors with STEM expertise remained underrepresented on boards, increasing from 8% to just 13% over the period. <\/p>\n

By comparison, directors with backgrounds in the traditional fields of accounting, banking and law occupied 42% of board seats (up from 40% in 2007). Directors with \u201cC-suite\u201d experience \u2013 roles such as chief executive officer, chief financial officer and so on \u2013 made up 35% of all board positions in 2022.<\/p>\n

Even in industries with a scientific focus, such as technology and…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the age of AI, why do Australian company boards have so few technology experts?…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":230230,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/images.theconversation.com\/files\/727772\/original\/file-20260402-71-simxeo.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&rect=0%2C502%2C5700%2C2850&q=45&auto=format&w=1356&h=668&fit=crop","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[20],"class_list":["post-230229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificial-intelligence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230229"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=230229"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":230231,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230229\/revisions\/230231"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=230229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=230229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=230229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}