Knowledge Areas
From AI Governance to AI Literacy (KA13). Each area with activities, roles, metrics and standards.
Roles
Complete role model with 20x13 RACI matrix, separation of duties and the AI Literacy Officer (Role 20).
Failure Modes
22 patterns where agentic and cyber-physical AI structurally fails - including drill scenarios and cognition-plane binding.
Lifecycle Phases
From ideation to decommissioning, with feedback loops, gate criteria and sprint checklists.
Templates
Governance Charter, Model Card, EU AI Act Checklist, Maturity Assessment and Shadow AI Inventory.
Choose your edition
Both editions contain the same complete content with 18 diagrams
AI Body of Knowledge
251 pagesAI Body of Knowledge (NL)
Het referentiekader voor AI-governance, lifecycle management en organisatie-inrichting
AI Body of Knowledge
287 pagesAI Body of Knowledge (EN)
The reference framework for AI governance, lifecycle management and organizational design
AI-BOK Toolkit v1.2
Five working files alongside the book: ArchiMate modelling conventions, KA9 risk-control library (YAML), maturity calibration kit, AI procurement clauses and filled example templates. Drop into your own organisation right away.
- ✓ArchiMate modelling conventions (purist mapping)
- ✓KA9 risk-control library (YAML checklist)
- ✓Maturity calibration kit + inter-assessor protocol
- ✓AI procurement clauses for contracts
- ✓Filled example templates (Charter, Model Card, IAMA, Article 4 evidence)
No registration required. ZIP with 5 PDFs (branded, ready to read) + Markdown sources + README (~940 KB). Dutch edition available on the Dutch page.
Sneak peek inside the book
Four of 18 diagrams from the AI-BOK - free preview
The 13 knowledge areas with AI Governance as the central hub
The AI Lifecycle Model with 8 phases and 3 feedback loops
Knowledge areas mapped onto the three planes (Data / Control / Cognition)
Eight role-based reading paths plus the MVG-7 growth path - new in v1.2
RACI matrix with 20 roles
Who is responsible, accountable, consulted and informed per knowledge area? The complete RACI matrix eliminates ambiguity.
5 ready-to-use templates
Governance Charter, Model Card, EU AI Act Checklist, Maturity Assessment and Shadow AI Inventory. Ready to fill in.
CIO 30-day plan
Week by week concrete actions to get AI governance off the ground. From inventory to board decision in one month.
Prefer listening?
Discover the essence of the AI-BOK in a podcast episode — available in Dutch and English.
Securing Enterprise AI with the AI-BOK
How do you govern AI at enterprise scale? From the 13 knowledge areas and the cognition plane to operationalising the EU AI Act.
Governing Autonomous Non-Human Identities
AI agents as digital employees: why they need a formal identity profile, lifecycle management and a human owner. About the cognition plane, governance hooks and the key cabinet pattern.
Grip op Shadow AI met de AI-BOK
Employees are already using ChatGPT and Claude without IT knowing. How do you inventory and govern Shadow AI?
Manage AI agents as real employees
Your next colleague is an AI agent. Why agents need a mandate, escalation protocol and exit procedure.
How your AI project survives production
70% of AI projects never make it to production. About the 8 phases of the AI lifecycle and why 50% of costs come after launch.
AI-BOK Unplugged — The framework behind responsible AI
Read a chapter from the book
The foreword and the Start Here guide — directly applicable, no purchase required.
What changed: v1.0 to v1.2
Two minor releases, one goal: a workable, audit-ready reference framework for AI governance.
Foundation: 12 knowledge areas + 19 roles
- ·12 knowledge areas (KA1 to KA12) as canonical decomposition
- ·19 roles distributed across 4 governance levels
- ·8-phase lifecycle (from ideation to decommissioning)
- ·10 metamodel entities + 5-level maturity model
- ·Open ArchiMate 3.2 reference model with 48 views
Depth: agentic AI + regulation
- ·Cognition plane as architectural integration layer (Mandate, NHI lifecycle, Authority Register, Policy-as-code, Escalation)
- ·16 agentic AI failure modes (FM01-FM16) with cognition-plane binding
- ·Regulatory traceability matrix across 9 jurisdictions (EU AI Act, NIS2, NIST, ISO 42001/23894/38507, VNG, BZK, US state laws)
- ·Maturity evidence rubric (D/M/L per KA x level, with inter-assessor protocol)
- ·Operational + cyber-physical addendum (three-tier device/edge/centre)
Integration + parity: KA13, Role 20, 22 FMs
- ·KA13 AI Literacy & Capability Development integrated into canonical Module 1 (EU AI Act Article 4)
- ·Role 20 AI Literacy Officer (Article 4 evidence file owner)
- ·6 operational/cyber-physical failure modes (FM17-FM22) added - 22 patterns total
- ·5 standalone addenda integrated as Module 3 sub-sections (3.3.8-3.3.9, 3.4.9, 3.6.7-3.6.8)
- ·Role-based reading paths (8 paths) + Minimum Viable Governance profile (MVG-7)
- ·NL + EN at full parity for the first time since v1.0
- ·Open ArchiMate model expanded to 52 views; 1066 relations
- ·SemanticXL pack ai-bok-1.2 (112 reference claims + 4 guardrails)
What is on the planning board
Five work packages that strengthen the framework in upcoming releases.
SemanticXL ai-bok pack live
The ai-bok-1.2 pack as a runtime overlay in SemanticXL: 112 claims, 4 guardrails (MVG-7, FM coverage, Article 4 evidence, cognition-plane binding). Organisations load their own ArchiMate model and run gap analyses on the spot.
NHI Federation Protocol (RFC draft)
Standards-track proposal for cross-organisation NHI mandate exchange: JOSE token format, revocation propagation, freshness budget across organisational boundaries. Builds on the cognition plane.
AI-BOK Conformance Suite
`ai-bok check` CLI: ingest AI portfolio + ArchiMate model, output JSON with MVG-7 status, FM coverage percentage and KA maturity heatmap. Open source, vendor neutral.
Regulatory monitor
Continuous scraping of EU OJ, Dutch DPA, BZK, NIST, IMDA publications. Diff against the regulatory matrix; push notifications with impact mapping to KAs and evidence files.
Sector overlays
Three sector overlays: banking (BCBS-239 / EBA), healthcare (FDA SaMD / EU MDR) and municipal (VNG deepdive). Each: 30-page booklet with 5 worked examples on the canonical MVG-7.
Join the open reference architecture: download the ArchiMate model and contribute feedback through the community issues.
Open reference architectureAI is transforming your organization - whether you are ready or not
Your employees are already using ChatGPT, Copilot, Claude, Cursor and Gemini - often without IT knowing. The EU AI Act is in effect. Customers expect transparency about AI decisions. Every month without AI governance is a month without control over your biggest technology transformation.
Take the free Quick ScanWhy an AI Body of Knowledge?
ISO 42001 offers a management system but no knowledge area structure. NIST AI RMF offers risk management but no role model. The EU AI Act offers legal frameworks but no implementation guide.
The AI-BOK brings these puzzle pieces together and fills the gaps.
Written for the CIO who needs to present an AI governance proposal to the board tomorrow. For the enterprise architect who must fit AI into an existing landscape. For the CHRO shaping workforce transformation. And for the project manager deploying an AI system to production for the first time.
About the author
Jan Willem van Veen
Principal Enterprise Architect
Over 25 years of experience at the intersection of technology, organization and meaning. From the first enterprise architectures in the public sector to the current generation of AI systems. Background in semantic web technology, knowledge graphs and linked data.