Directly Responsible Individuals (DRI)

Simon Willison's Blog News

Summary

The article explains the concept of Directly Responsible Individuals (DRI) from Apple/GitLab and argues that LLM-powered agents should never be considered DRIs because they cannot take accountability.

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# Directly Responsible Individuals (DRI) Source: [https://simonwillison.net/2026/Jul/12/directly-responsible-individuals/](https://simonwillison.net/2026/Jul/12/directly-responsible-individuals/) 12th July 2026 \- Link Blog **[Directly Responsible Individuals \(DRI\)](https://handbook.gitlab.com/handbook/people-group/directly-responsible-individuals/)**\. I went looking for a definition of "Directly Responsible Individuals" and the best I found was in the GitLab handbook\. Apparently the term originated at Apple, where it's used to describe the person who is "ultimately accountable for the success or failure of a specific project, initiative, or activity"\. I've been thinking about this term recently in the context of LLM\-powered agents and how they fit into human organizations\. I don't think an agent should*ever*be considered the DRI for a project \- that's something that feels uniquely human to me, because humans can take accountability for their actions where machines cannot\. \(See also[IBM's legendary 1979 training slide](https://simonwillison.net/2025/Feb/3/a-computer-can-never-be-held-accountable/)that states "A computer can never be held accountable, therefore a computer must never make a management decision\."\)

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