One sentence from Norway's Parliamentary Ombudsman is the sharpest statement of this argument found anywhere in Europe, and the case it came from finished six months ago. Keynotes for boards, public sector leadership and conferences in Oslo.
Rahim Hirji is available for in-person AI keynotes in Oslo, Norway, and for online sessions worldwide. He is a London-based keynote speaker specialising in AI and human judgement, and the author of SuperSkills (Kogan Page, 2026). He founded the skills platform EtonX, later acquired by Eton College, and led Quizlet’s international growth across more than 60 countries.
The local policy
The Sivilombudet NAV rulings, and Statistics NorwayRead at the issuing body’s own page, and quoted in full below.
Watch the showreel · 2 minutes
A feel for how I work with an audience before you put me in front of yours.
SuperSkills is endorsed by Karim Lakhani (Harvard Business School), Alnoor Bhimani (London School of Economics), David Rowan (founding editor, WIRED UK), Sherry Coutu CBE and ten others. Rahim has spoken to leadership teams at Google, Barclays, Kaplan, BPP University and Next 15. Published by Kogan Page, part of Hachette UK.
In their words
“Rahim's keynote on human judgement in the age of AI was brilliant. We asked for something realistic rather than alarmist, and equally not falsely reassuring, and he delivered exactly that. Our students were captivated by every word, and we want him back.”
Charlotte Wanendeya, Head of Law, BPP University Law School. Booked a keynote and panel for law students.
“We brought Rahim in to speak to our teams in the Corporate Bank about what AI actually changes for the people doing the work. He handled a demanding room and left them with something they could act on rather than only something to think about.”
Stuart Foster, Head of Coverage, UK Corporate Banking, Barclays.
On the book
“A book unafraid to hold the human weight of technological transformation.”
Dr Tom Chatfield, Author of Wise Animals
How a session in Oslo is put together
Every keynote is tailored after a briefing call, and the larger engagements start before the day: a diagnostic of the client's own people, so the audience hears its own evidence. Whatever the people there agree is written down.
What that has looked like: about 1,500 people joining a session run hybrid from central London at short notice, for a technology business changing AI tools faster than its people could absorb, which became executive coaching for the transformation lead; and an agency business convening Asia, Asia-Pacific, EMEA and North America into one event, where the work was naming the recurring situations nobody had vocabulary for, and the company took that wording into its strategy.
Six of the seven engagements published on this site produced further work after the session ended. The seven are set out in full at case studies, each with a line saying what it does not show.
How to read these examples. They are published to show how the work is put together, not as a client list for Oslo. Most engagements are covered by confidentiality and are described without naming anyone; where a client is named anywhere on this site, it is with their agreement.
The sentence, and what it cost to get it
In January 2023 the Norwegian Parliamentary Ombudsman decided a complaint about NAV, the labour and welfare administration, cutting a disability benefit through a fully automated process with no manual handling. The finding contains this:
Selv om den automatiske løsningen i de aller fleste tilfeller vil fatte en riktig avgjørelse, har man i prinsippet godtatt en helautomatisk løsning som man er klar over vil fatte uriktige vedtak i noen av tilfellene.
Even though the automated solution will in the vast majority of cases reach a correct decision, one has in principle accepted a fully automated solution that one knows will make incorrect decisions in some of the cases.
That is the trade every organisation makes when it automates a consequential decision, stated plainly by a supervisory body, without hedging and without the word efficiency anywhere near it. Most institutions have made the same trade and have never written the sentence down.
And it finished. The ministry told the Ombudsman on 27 February 2026 that NAV had changed practice, with a notice and a three-week window now preceding the decision, and the case was closed on 19 March 2026. Three years to put a human window in front of a machine.
Opening a SuperSkills keynote, 2025
A second case, still open, at a scale that changes the question
The Ombudsman has a live file on NAV’s sickness benefit system, with follow-ups through 11 August 2026. The scale is the part worth carrying into a keynote: 2.1 million applications in 2024, of which 65 per cent were fully automated.
The line from that file is the one to quote to a board: technological limitations in the digital solutions cannot reduce citizens’ legal protection without a legal basis. Substitute your own noun for citizens and it is a governance principle rather than an administrative one.
Norway’s Office of the Auditor General graded government AI governance ikke tilfredsstillende, not satisfactory, in September 2024. And the Ombudsman has separately ruled against Oslo municipality that efficiency and system limitations cannot justify routinely omitting the decision-maker’s name from a decision, which is the accountability question at what is a moral crumple zone.
The statute that is not yet in force, said plainly
Norway passed a new administrative procedure act in June 2025. It requires that the legal content of automated case-processing systems be documented and that the documentation be published, and it gives an affected person a right to an explanation and to manual review.
It is not yet in force. The commencement is for the King in Council to decide and the record still shows it as not commenced. Saying so from a stage costs nothing and is the difference between a speaker who read the statute and one who read a summary of it. Norway’s position on the EU AI Act, as an EEA state, was also unresolved at the time of checking and is not asserted here.
What Norway has measured is not in doubt. Statistics Norway found 54 per cent of people aged 16 to 79 had used generative AI in the previous three months, up eighteen points in a year, and that 63 per cent of those users use it in a work context. Enterprise use is 28.9 per cent, which would place Norway eighth in the European Union. Seventy-seven per cent of non-adopting firms cite a lack of relevant competence, up from 69 per cent, which is a striking thing to say about a tool marketed as requiring none.
Who books this in Oslo, and who should not
Public sector leadership and directorates, energy and shipping, banks and the sovereign fund ecosystem, and the technology community around Oslo Innovation Week. Norwegian audiences tend to want the caveats stated rather than smoothed, which suits this material.
He is the wrong choice for a session that needs an unqualified case for adoption.
A note from Rahim
The Norwegian sentence I keep quoting
One sentence from Norway's Parliamentary Ombudsman states this whole argument more sharply than anything else in Europe. The NAV case behind it closed six months ago; a second is open, and a statute is waiting to come into force. Any Norwegian organisation using automated decisions is a step away from the same scrutiny. Since 2017 I have written Box of Amazing every week, and I have advised companies across Europe. I build the examples from what Statistics Norway reports on use, so your board can give the Ombudsman an answer tomorrow.
Rahim's keynotes in Oslo sit alongside his advisory engagements in Europe and Box of Amazing, his free weekly letter. Keynotes · Advisory · Box of Amazing
The three keynotes on offer in Oslo
Keynotes run 30 to 90 minutes, in person or virtual. A 30-minute main-stage version of each talk is available for conferences, and the full talk runs 45 to 60 minutes. The sector examples are chosen for each audience, around the same argument. All three, with the showreel, are at keynotes, and the programme copy is at the speaker pack.
Drift versus Design is built from your room. Your audience answers five anonymous questions beforehand, their answers shape the talk, and afterwards you get a one-page readout with the three decisions to look at first.
Drift versus Design: why most organisations hand their judgement to AI without deciding to, and how to design your way through instead.
The Sivilombudet's NAV rulings show what drift costs when nobody owns an automated decision. An executive team finds that pattern in its operations, then designs who decides, and when.
We Are Superheroes
We Are Superheroes: AI is the suit. The human decides.
Built for whole organisations as much as conference halls, the Oslo version asks a question Norway is already asking in public: when a system decides about a person, where does the person stand?
WTH (What the Human)
WTH (What the Human): a live test of a leadership team's own judgement.
A one-page board pre-read carries the Ombudsman's sentence. In the session, directors rehearse their answer if a case like NAV reached them, with a second case still open and a statute waiting.
Where these sessions happen in Oslo
Oslo Kongressenter, Folkets Hus
The Kongresshallen takes 1,600 theatre and Sal A 690, in the centre by Youngstorget. The city's default congress building.
NOVA Spektrum, Lørenskog
Five halls and 34,855 square metres, outside the city. Formerly Norges Varemesse, and the old domain no longer resolves, which is worth knowing when checking a brief.
Oslo Spektrum
Operating, and under expansion: a new congress and culture stage completes in autumn 2028. Arena scale rather than conference scale.
NDC Oslo runs 14 to 18 September 2026 at Oslo Spektrum and Oslo Innovation Week 19 to 22 October 2026. Two to keep out of a Norwegian plan: Slush is Helsinki, and Nordic Edge and ONS are Stavanger rather than Oslo. Norway is outside the European Union, so invoicing and VAT need settling early. July is empty.
Formats and logistics
Signature keynote
Drift versus Design
Length
30 to 90 minutes, or a board session
Language
English
Region
Oslo and Norway
Delivery
In person and online
Based
London, travels to Oslo
Local anchor
The Sivilombudet NAV rulings, and Statistics Norway
A typical first call“We automated because the volume made it necessary. Nobody has ever written down what we accepted when we did.”
Before you book
Questions asked about Oslo.
Who is a good AI keynote speaker in Oslo?
Rahim Hirji is a London-based keynote speaker on AI, work and human judgement and the author of SuperSkills (Kogan Page, 2026). He speaks in English to public sector, energy, financial and technology audiences in Oslo. The Norwegian version of the keynote works from the Parliamentary Ombudsman's rulings on NAV, the Office of the Auditor General's 2024 assessment, and Statistics Norway's own measurement. The research behind the talk is published in full, drawn from work with more than 200 organisations in over 30 countries. The research behind the talk is published in full, drawn from work with more than 200 organisations in over 30 countries.
What did Norway's Parliamentary Ombudsman actually find?
In a 2023 decision on NAV cutting a disability benefit through a fully automated process, the Ombudsman wrote that even though the automated solution will in the vast majority of cases reach a correct decision, one has in principle accepted a fully automated solution that one knows will make incorrect decisions in some of the cases. The ministry reported a change of practice on 27 February 2026, with a notice and three-week window now preceding the decision, and the case closed on 19 March 2026.
Is Norway's new administrative procedure act in force?
Not yet. The act was passed in June 2025 and requires that the legal content of automated case-processing systems be documented and published, with a right to an explanation and to manual review. Commencement is for the King in Council and the official record still shows it as not in force. Norway's position on the EU AI Act as an EEA state was also unresolved at the time of checking, and this site does not assert it either way.
How far in advance should we book Rahim Hirji for an event in Oslo?
Three to six months ahead for an in-person date in Oslo. Shorter is often possible for a virtual session, and sometimes in person where the diary is free and the talk already exists in the form you need. Ask early. There is one of him, he carries advisory clients and other commitments alongside the speaking, so not every date can be taken.
What does it cost to bring Rahim Hirji to Oslo?
Most conference keynotes come in around £10,000. What moves it: the time I commit, travel, how full the diary is that month, and how far the talk is built for your room. What moves the number is set out at what an AI keynote speaker costs. Send the date, the audience and what you need them to do differently, and Rahim comes back with a number within a working day. Schools, universities and charities are quoted differently. On travel there is one rule: outside London you book it and you pay it, because your rates are better than his and nobody is out of pocket waiting on a reimbursement. From London to Oslo is under three hours, so an economy fare and arrival the night before. One night is usually enough, and a same-day return is possible for an afternoon slot if that suits the budget better. A London booking carries no travel, accommodation or expenses at all.
When is Rahim Hirji not the right speaker for an event?
When the decision has already been made and the session exists to announce it. When the audience has no authority over their own work, because the talk asks them to decide which repetitions are worth keeping. When the slot runs under thirty minutes, because the turn needs setting up. And when the session follows a vendor pitch, since order matters more than programmes usually assume. Where the conditions are wrong we will say so, and sometimes that means reshaping the session. Occasionally it means recommending somebody else.
Not every brief is a talk. A board that needs to settle which decisions a machine may make wants a board briefing, a review or a standing advisor, and the five formats are set out side by side with what each one is for.
Box of Amazing
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Charlotte Wanendeya, Head of Law, BPP University Law School. Booked a keynote and panel for law students.
