BlogginläggWhile technology is more accessible than ever, women are still standing on the sidelines. That is dangerous, because together we need to determine what the relationship between humans and AI will look like and what direction AI will take. We need both male and female perspectives to shape that future.
When I travel to work in the morning, I listen to a personal podcast created for me by my AI agents. The podcast catches me up on my priorities for the day, global news relevant to my field, sensitive issues in my chats and emails that need attention, and gives me a little philosophical pep talk — a new one every day.
Unfortunately, I am an exception.
Women tend to be hesitant when it comes to AI, and that is good for no one. While the ten largest and most influential AI companies in the world are all led by men, and men are also overrepresented among programmers and users, women are hanging back. One important reason is that women are concerned about the societal and ethical consequences of AI, according to recent research by, among others, the Oxford Internet Institute, titled ‘Women worry, men adopt: How Gendered Perceptions Shape the Use of Generative AI’.
Meanwhile, their male colleagues are being praised for becoming so much more productive thanks to AI.
One of the sharpest thinkers on AI, Ethan Mollick, professor and author of Co-Intelligence, says that the opportunity to influence the development of AI is now. We are at the beginning of an incredibly impressive revolution, and the mould is still soft. The prompts we work with today will influence how these systems behave tomorrow. We can still prevent blind spots from being set in stone.
AI has no consciousness of its own and no moral compass. It learns from us — from our data, our choices and priorities, and also from our biases.
For example: Who gets a loan? Who gets invited to a job interview? Which patient receives priority? These are decisions we do not want to leave to algorithms trained from a single perspective.
We can use AI for autonomous weapons systems, surveillance on an unprecedented scale, and to replace people in the workplace more cheaply, quickly and effectively. But we can also use it to cure diseases faster, reduce hunger, develop new medicines and accelerate scientific breakthroughs.
We are responsible for raising and shaping these systems, and that requires both fathers and mothers — masculine and feminine input. Empathy, attention to the collective and long-term thinking are at least as important as speed, efficiency and the capacity to innovate.
It will not be long before teams consist of a mix of humans and AI agents. It would make sense for HR professionals, who are often women, to be at the forefront of thinking about AI: How will we divide roles and responsibilities? What do we hand over to AI, and what do we keep under human control? And how do we remain the ones in charge?
Yet this is still happening far too little.
Here is an example from my own field: AI can map complex global food supply chains on a large scale and in real time — something that was never possible before. It can analyse worker compensation on a coffee plantation far away, water use, land use, deforestation, CO₂ emissions and much more.
But only human experts can determine what constitutes fair pay, what ambitions we should pursue and where improvements are needed. That does not automatically make its way into the system. We need multiple perspectives.
The good news is that AI is removing an important barrier. You no longer need to be a seasoned programmer to develop applications or automate processes. That is precisely why now should be the moment when many more women step in.
It is not about finding the shortest route to success. It is about experimenting and discovering new possibilities through creativity and imagination.
My call to everyone who is concerned — and to women in particular — is: start experimenting.
Talk to a chatbot. Build a simple agent. Make mistakes. Try again. Don’t wait until you understand everything.
AI is still a toddler, but one that is already actively participating in the adult world.
The future of AI is being shaped right now. The values we put into it today will determine how we live alongside this technology tomorrow.
So don’t stay on the sidelines. Get involved in raising it. – Leontien Hasselman-Plugge is CEO of data tech company ImpactBuying.
