Fiduciary Duty in the Age of AI

Boards are entrusted with safeguarding mission and money. In an era of rapid technological change, stewardship now includes something more: ensuring that resources, financial and human, are not quietly lost to preventable inefficiency.

Board members understand fiduciary duty.

Protect the organization’s financial health.
Exercise care.
Act with loyalty.
Ensure sustainability.

Those responsibilities haven’t changed.

But the environment has.

Over the past year, I’ve had more conversations with board members about artificial intelligence and operational effectiveness than I ever expected. Some are excited. Some are cautious. Most are unsure where it fits within governance.

The hesitation is understandable. Technology can feel operational. Tactical. Staff-level.

But the more I reflect on my time as a board chair, the more I’ve come to believe this:

In today’s environment, operational effectiveness is not separate from fiduciary responsibility. It’s part of it.

Every nonprofit board asks whether donor dollars are being spent wisely.

But how often do we ask whether staff time is being spent wisely?

How much of an organization’s budget quietly disappears into manual processes, duplicated effort, unnecessary meetings, and legacy systems that no longer serve the mission?

Those costs don’t show up as line items labeled “waste.”
They show up as burnout.
As delayed initiatives.
As opportunities that never quite launch.

When AI enters the conversation, many boards immediately jump to risk: data privacy, ethics, unintended consequences. Those are important questions. They deserve serious oversight.

But there is another risk that receives far less attention:

What if we fail to explore tools that could free human capacity for higher-value work?

What if avoiding innovation slowly erodes impact?

Fiduciary duty has always required prudence.
It has never required paralysis.

Responsible AI is not about replacing people.
It is about protecting them and the mission they serve.

It might mean automating repetitive administrative work so educators can focus on students.
Streamlining reporting so development teams can spend more time building relationships.
Using data intelligently to make clearer, more confident decisions.

These are not tech projects.
They are stewardship decisions.

Boards do not need to become technology experts. But they do need to ask disciplined questions:

• Are we evaluating how effectively we use our human capital?

• Do our systems align with our stated priorities?

• Are we stewarding time with the same seriousness as money?

• Are we creating the conditions for responsible innovation or quietly resisting it out of discomfort?

The Jewish nonprofit world is not operating in a resource-rich moment. Donor expectations are rising. Needs are expanding. Professional staff are stretched thin.

In that environment, operational effectiveness is not a luxury. It is an obligation.

After October 7, many organizations have had to move faster, respond more quickly, communicate more clearly. Crisis has a way of revealing both strength and fragility in systems.

Strong governance does not mean micromanaging tools. It means ensuring that the organization is structurally capable of delivering on its mission, both sustainably and ethically.

That includes being open to technologies that increase impact, reduce unnecessary friction, and preserve human judgment where it matters most.

Fiduciary duty in the age of AI is not about chasing trends.

It is about asking a sober question:

Are we maximizing every dollar and every hour entrusted to us?

Boards have always been guardians of resources.

Now, they are also guardians of how intelligently those resources are used.

That, too, is stewardship.