Organizations deploying AI systems face critical challenges in maintaining performance, ensuring ethical compliance, and managing enterprise risks. This course equips you with the technical and strategic skills to optimize machine learning models, implement governance frameworks, and deploy AI systems responsibly in production environments.

Optimizing and Governing AI Systems

Optimizing and Governing AI Systems
This course is part of GenAI Ops: Running Powerful Generative AI Systems Professional Certificate

Instructor: Professionals from the Industry
Included with
Recommended experience
What you'll learn
Build monitoring systems and governance frameworks to ensure AI reliability, fairness, and ethical compliance across production environments.
Evaluate model architectures using statistical testing and create ensemble systems that combine algorithms for superior performance.
Automate ML experimentation workflows to track hypotheses, validate model updates through A/B testing, and measure business impact systematically.
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February 2026
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There are 13 modules in this course
You will learn strategic patch management approaches that optimize security posture while maintaining business continuity for AI systems infrastructure. It bridges theoretical frameworks with practical, enterprise-scale implementation techniques.
What's included
3 videos1 reading2 assignments
You will learn MTTR trend analysis techniques that identify system resilience patterns and enable proactive infrastructure improvements for AI operations.
What's included
3 videos2 readings2 assignments
You will design comprehensive governance frameworks with enforceable policies and technical guardrails that ensure responsible AI deployment while enabling enterprise innovation.
What's included
2 videos2 readings3 assignments
You will learn systematic frameworks for measuring and mitigating algorithmic bias using fairness metrics like demographic parity and equalized odds, enabling them to conduct enterprise-ready ethical risk assessments for AI deployment.
What's included
3 videos1 reading2 assignments
You will apply OKR frameworks and initiative mapping methodologies to evaluate AI roadmaps against business objectives, calculating ROI and identifying strategic gaps to secure executive support for AI investments.
What's included
3 videos1 reading2 assignments
You will develop comprehensive governance frameworks and organizational structures for AI Centers of Excellence, creating charters that standardize best practices and enable scalable, compliant AI operations across the enterprise.
What's included
2 videos1 reading3 assignments
You will systematically evaluate the balance between model performance and interpretability in production environments by applying a four-dimensional assessment framework that considers regulatory intensity, stakeholder involvement, decision impact, and technical constraints. Through industry examples from Netflix, Airbnb, and Goldman Sachs, participants will learn to map performance-interpretability frontiers, establish minimum performance thresholds, and make evidence-based model selection decisions that reflect business context rather than defaulting to maximum accuracy or maximum interpretability.
What's included
3 videos1 reading1 assignment
You will implement rigorous statistical testing frameworks to validate algorithm improvements through paired t-tests, bootstrap resampling, cross-validation significance testing, and production A/B experiments. Participants will learn to distinguish genuine algorithmic improvements from random variation by calculating p-values, effect sizes, and confidence intervals, while understanding how Netflix, Goldman Sachs, and Airbnb use statistical validation to prevent costly deployment mistakes caused by misinterpreting measurement noise as genuine performance gains.
What's included
3 videos1 reading2 assignments
You will architect production-ready ensemble systems that combine diverse algorithms through bagging, boosting, and stacking methodologies to achieve superior robustness and performance. Participants will implement strategic diversity mechanisms, balance computational complexity against performance gains, and design systems with graceful degradation capabilities. Through examples from Netflix's 107+ algorithm recommendation system and Goldman Sachs' trading algorithms, learners will understand how industry leaders create ensemble architectures that maintain consistent performance across unpredictable production conditions.
What's included
2 videos1 reading3 assignments
You will interpret ML models using SHAP and LIME techniques to detect bias and ensure fairness. This module covers generating feature importance explanations, creating visualizations to reveal model logic, and segmenting analysis by demographics to identify disparate impact. Participants will calculate fairness metrics like demographic parity and equal opportunity, connect interpretability findings to bias remediation strategies, and apply techniques used by Amazon SageMaker Clarify for enterprise-scale responsible AI operations.
What's included
3 videos1 reading2 assignments
You will evaluate ML model updates through controlled A/B testing that measures real business impact with statistical rigor. This module covers experimental design including hypothesis formation, metric selection with guardrails, randomization strategies, and sample size calculation. Participants will implement statistical tests using Python to distinguish genuine improvements from noise, interpret confidence intervals and p-values, and apply validation frameworks used by production teams at ShopBack and AWS to prevent costly deployment mistakes.
What's included
2 videos2 readings1 assignment
You will design automated experimentation frameworks using MLflow that standardize tracking, metrics, and analysis to accelerate innovation. This module covers six architectural components including experiment registries, metric computation with dbt, and statistical automation. Through technology selection balancing build-versus-buy decisions and integration with tools like Snowflake and Airflow, participants will create implementation roadmaps that scale teams from 10-20 manual experiments to 50-100+ automated experiments annually with consistent methodology.
What's included
2 videos3 readings3 assignments
You will develop comprehensive AI governance frameworks integrating performance monitoring, ethical oversight, and strategic decision-making for reliable AI operations. This module covers four foundational components, including user segment analysis, technical trade-off evaluation, governance policies with human oversight, and experimental validation processes. Through systematic monitoring templates, decision-making guidelines, and A/B testing frameworks, participants will create implementation roadmaps that enable organizations to scale AI systems while maintaining equitable service delivery, managing risks, and ensuring statistical rigor in deployment decisions over 6-month rollout cycles.
What's included
5 readings1 assignment
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Frequently asked questions
This course is designed for intermediate learners with ML fundamentals and Python experience. While you don't need prior governance expertise, you should understand basic machine learning concepts, statistical analysis, and large language models to successfully apply the governance and optimization frameworks taught in this course.
You'll work with performance monitoring systems, statistical validation frameworks, ensemble modeling techniques, automated experimentation pipelines, and governance documentation tools. You'll gain practical experience evaluating generative AI systems, including prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), and model fine-tuning approaches used in production environments.
This course bridges technical ML skills with strategic business thinking, preparing you for roles like AI/ML engineer, AI governance specialist, MLOps engineer, and technical AI leader. You'll create portfolio projects demonstrating your ability to optimize models, implement governance frameworks, and lead cross-functional teams in responsible AI deployment—skills highly sought after as organizations scale AI systems.
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Financial aid available,
¹ Some assignments in this course are AI-graded. For these assignments, your data will be used in accordance with Coursera's Privacy Notice.





