01
Green: When You Can Move Forward
The three questions that tell you whether an AI use is approved, protected, and accountable.
Key questionAre we approved, protected, and accountable?
Free 37-Minute AI Use Policy Workshop for Small Business
Can We Use AI for That? An AI Use Policy for Small Business, Without a Legal Department.
Your employees are already using AI to write customer emails, draft job posts, answer questions, and get through the day. Some of it happens on personal phones. But who in your business decides what's okay, what information stays out, and when a person needs to check the work?
Learn how to set practical AI use rules for your small business with the Green Light, Red Flag framework. Know when an AI use can proceed, what needs review, and who has authority to decide.
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Watch on demand. Your AI Decision Guide is included.
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Free Workshop: Can We Use AI For That?
Join Margaret Spence for a free 37-minute, on-demand workshop on AI use policy for small business. It is built for owners and the HR department of one: businesses with fewer than 200 employees, no legal team down the hall, and AI decisions that land on whoever is in the room. Learn to apply the Green Light, Red Flag framework to identify approved uses, recognize risks, and decide who has the authority to say yes.
You'll also receive an AI Decision Guide to evaluate the AI uses already happening in your business and document your next steps.
You are not the only owner asking. In a 2026 survey of Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses participants, 73% said additional training and implementation resources would help them use AI successfully. Source
The workshop includes examples from HR and nonprofit workplaces. The questions work the same in a business your size.
What is an AI use policy for small business?
An AI use policy for small business sets practical rules for how owners, managers, and employees may use artificial intelligence: which tools are approved, what customer and employee information stays out, who can approve a new use, and when a person must review the work before it goes out.
Does a business with fewer than 200 employees need an AI use policy?
If your employees use AI, yes. A short, clear policy protects customer and employee information, makes it clear who decides, and keeps each manager from setting their own rules. The U.S. Small Business Administration advises keeping sensitive information out of AI tools and having a person review AI-generated work.
In a Small Business, AI Decisions Get Made by Whoever Is in the Room. That Is Not a Policy.
- Is this AI tool okay for this use?
- Can we put customer or employee information into it?
- Who owns the decision if the output is wrong?
- Does the owner decide, or HR, the office manager, or our IT provider?
- What happens when a manager starts using AI on a personal phone?
- When do we need to call our attorney or insurance broker?
Your small business does not need a 50-page AI use policy. Start by defining what is allowed, what requires review, and who decides.
What you'll learn in 37 minutes
Green, Yellow, or Red? Put Your Small Business AI Use Policy Into Practice.
02
Yellow: When You Need to Slow Down and Ask
How to spot uncertainty around authority, data, privacy, intellectual property, human oversight, and accountability.
Key questionWhat is unclear, and who needs to decide?
03
Red: When You Stop and Escalate
The situations where your team should not proceed on its own.
Key questionAre we exposed, unauthorized, or unable to defend the decision?
04
Stuck in Yellow: The Approval Bottleneck
Sometimes the AI is not the bottleneck. The decision process is. You'll learn to ask:
- Who owns the business decision?
- Who has approval authority, and who can stop it?
- What evidence do they need?
- What happens when the owner, the manager, and the IT provider disagree?
The reframeA governance delay is not always a risk problem. Sometimes it is a decision-rights problem.
Included with your registration
Your AI Use Decision Guide: Green, Yellow, or Red?
Apply your AI use rules to real situations: identify what needs review, who owns approval, and the next action.
- Evaluate a current AI use case
- Classify it as Green, Yellow, or Red
- Surface the governance questions nobody has answered
- Identify the right approval authority
- Document the next action before anyone moves forward
Built for Small Business Owners and the HR Department of One
You do not need a legal department to govern AI. You need clear rules and someone who decides.
Margaret Spence
Your workshop leader
AI governance strategist, former insurance risk executive, founder of Inclusion Learning Lab, and author of When AI Breaks the Law: AI Governance for Talent Leaders.
Margaret began her business 27 years ago serving small employers. Today she translates AI risk, policy, and law into the everyday decisions owners and HR leaders make.
Your Business Is Small. Your AI Decisions Are Not.
Move.
Question.
Escalate.
Get Free Workshop + Decision Guide
Free. 37 minutes. On demand. AI Decision Guide included.