The Risk Wheelhouse Podcast
The Risk Wheelhouse is the podcast dedicated to exploring how RiskTech is reshaping the future of risk management. Hosted by our experts, Ori Wellington and Sam Jones, each episode delves deep into Integrated Risk Management (IRM), offering insights into the latest trends, technologies, and strategies. Join us to stay ahead in the ever-evolving risk landscape and empower your organization with actionable knowledge.
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S8E4: The Death of the GRC Moat
That million dollar GRC pricing sheet on your screen might be selling you the digital equivalent of a 1980s filing cabinet. We pull apart why governance, risk, and compliance software suddenly looks like a gold rush in 2026, and why the old buying signals no longer work. The key shift: storing and linking risk data is largely a commodity, and even “enterprise hardening” security features are increasingly just cloud configuration. If a vendor’s big flex is secure storage plus a polished dashboard, we explain why that’s not a premium platform anymore.
S8E3: From Passive GRC To Autonomous IRM
Your risk platform might be perfectly secure, perfectly organized, and completely useless at the moment risk actually happens. We start with a blunt diagnosis of legacy GRC and integrated risk management software: it records history after the work is done, creating a dangerous latency gap between operations and compliance. Then we lay out the shift that is reorganizing the enterprise risk technology market, the agentic control plane, where the system can sense an anomaly, decide on a response, execute an intervention, and produce immutable proof in real time.
S8E2: How To Spot Real Autonomous AI In GRC Buying
“Autonomous AI” is not a vibe, it’s an architectural promise. When a vendor tells you their GRC platform can run compliance, risk, and controls without humans, they’re claiming a system of action: detect, decide, act, and verify in a closed loop. We dig into a sharp Wheelhouse Advisors report on Optro’s acquisition of Midship to separate what’s real from what’s merely well-written.
S8E1: Stop Asking For Another AI Framework
AI risk feels like driving at night with broken headlights, so leaders keep demanding “a new framework” that will finally make everything clear. We think that’s the wrong ask. The guidance already exists, and it’s more mature than most teams admit: the NIST AI Risk Management Framework, ISO/IEC 42001 certifications, sector-specific control objectives in financial services, and the hard edge of enforcement through the EU AI Act. The real reason risk and compliance teams still feel stuck is that frameworks are built to prove defensibility, not to tell you what to build.
We unpack John A. Wheeler’s argument from RiskTech Journal and translate it into a practical way to design an AI governance program that actually works day to day.
S7E4: Your Company Just Hired 10,000 Invisible Interns
10,000 invisible autonomous AI agents working inside a single enterprise sounds like a productivity dream until you realize no one can explain who chartered them, what data they touch, or what decisions they are quietly making. We take on the popular “AI agent sprawl” narrative head-on and argue for a sharper label: a governance failure in progress that can undermine integrated risk management from the inside out.
S7E2: The Autonomous IRM Enterprise and The AI Control Tower
You can feel the shift happening when you stop picturing “AI tools” and start picturing “AI workers.” From the floor of ServiceNow Knowledge 26 in Las Vegas, we zoom out from the shiny security headlines and explain what John A. Wheeler argues is the real story: autonomous integrated risk management (IRM) is the first credible blueprint for governing an enterprise where non-human identities execute the majority of actions.
S7E1: The Delve Collapse And The New Rules Of Enterprise Trust
A $300 million compliance darling collapsed not because regulators caught it, but because an anonymous Substack writer found a publicly accessible Google spreadsheet. Delve promised SOC 2 in days instead of months, raised a $32 million Series A from Insight Partners, and signed more than 1,000 enterprise clients across 50 countries. Then the whistleblowers alleged the product fundamentally didn't work as described — that Delve's agents were generating auditor conclusions before client data was even reviewed, and routing the output through offshore mills to rubber-stamp the results.
In the Season 7 premiere, Ori Wellington and Sam Jones dissect the anatomy of the failure and argue it is not an isolated fraud story. It is the predictable outcome of a market that rewards the announcement of agentic GRC capabilities while ignoring the program maturity that makes those capabilities trustworthy.
S6E1: NVIDIA CES 2026 - The Blueprint for Autonomous IRM
Season 6 opens with a clear message for Technology Risk Management leaders: autonomy is no longer constrained by model capability, it is constrained by infrastructure discipline and auditable management controls.
In S6E1, Ori Wellington and Sam Jones translate NVIDIA’s CES 2026 signals into a practical blueprint for Autonomous IRM, defined as continuous, AI-enabled verification and response loops that operate within explicit policy boundaries and generate audit-grade evidence by design. As inference costs fall, “always-on” control validation becomes economically viable at enterprise scale. That shift forces a new operating model: humans stop chasing evidence and start adjudicating pre-enriched exceptions with decision provenance, context, and rollback paths already assembled.
S4E6: When AI Agents Outnumber Humans
The rapid proliferation of AI agents throughout enterprise environments isn't just another tech trend—it's a fundamental transformation of how organizations operate. When Nikesh Arora, CEO of Palo Alto Networks, warns that "there's going to be more agents than humans running around trying to help manage your enterprise," he's highlighting a seismic shift that demands immediate attention.
S4E3: An Extinction Level Event - Risk in the Digital Age
Modern risk management stands at a precipice of transformation where AI-driven platforms are causing what ServiceNow's CEO Bill McDermott calls an "extinction-level event" for traditional software vendors. This profound shift is reshaping how organizations approach enterprise resilience, with implications for businesses across all sectors.
S4E2: Autonomous IRM - Orchestrating Risk at Machine Speed
The digital age has accelerated risk to unprecedented speeds, creating a fundamental challenge for organizations: how can you manage threats that move faster than humans can react? This paradigm shift has given rise to Autonomous Integrated Risk Management (IRM), a revolutionary approach that transitions from human-speed reactions to machine-speed foresight and response.
S3E9: Starved from the Edges – Why Connected Intelligence Matters in Autonomous IRM
When Automation Moves Fast—and Misses the Point
In this episode of The Risk Wheelhouse, Ori Wellington and Sam Jones expose the blind spot threatening today’s most advanced risk tech: isolation.
Autonomous IRM is no longer theory. AI platforms like Tuskira are already simulating threats and triggering real-time responses. But as this episode reveals, most operate in a vacuum—starved of strategic input from the top and assurance feedback from the bottom.
The result? High-speed automation chasing low-value noise.
S2E4: Autonomous IRM - AI Agents Redefining Risk Management
In this episode of The Risk Wheelhouse, hosts Ori Wellington and Sam Jones delve into the revolutionary concept of Autonomous Integrated Risk Management (IRM). By leveraging AI agents, businesses are transitioning from static risk management models to dynamic, predictive, and proactive frameworks that redefine how risks are identified, mitigated, and managed.
S1E5: AI Agents: Steering Integrated Risk Management into the Autonomous Era
In this episode, Ori Wellington and Sam Jones explore the transformative impact of AI on the Integrated Risk Management (IRM) market. According to the latest figures from Q4 2024, the IRM technology market is projected to grow from $55.8 billion in 2024 to $121.8 billion by 2031, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10.2%. This growth reflects a strong demand for advanced, autonomous risk management solutions. Drawing on insights from John A. Wheeler, CEO of Wheelhouse Advisors, they discuss how IRM is evolving from manual processes to AI-driven systems capable of real-time decision-making across the IRM Navigator™ Framework’s four pillars: performance, resilience, assurance, and compliance.
S1E4: IRM in the Fast Lane: Recap from John A. Wheeler’s Keynote at Riskonnect's User Conference
In this episode, Ori and Sam provide a re-cap of the impactful keynote delivered by John A. Wheeler, founder and CEO of Wheelhouse Advisors, at the Riskonnect User Conference - Konnect 2024. They explore how traditional risk management falls short in today’s fast-paced landscape and discuss Wheelhouse Advisors’ IRM Navigator Framework. Built around goals, processes, assets, and policies, this framework offers an integrated, proactive approach to managing risk.
S1E3: ServiceNow and Salesforce Enter the AI Agent Arena: Paving the Way for Autonomous IRM
In this episode, Ori and Sam delve into the rise of AI agents in risk management, spotlighting how ServiceNow and Salesforce are pioneering autonomous IRM systems. These AI agents go far beyond basic chatbots, capable of automating complex tasks and decision-making across entire departments. The hosts explore how this technology is transforming IRM, allowing businesses to anticipate risks, enhance compliance, and make smarter decisions with AI-driven insights.