Alejandro Franceschi’s Post

The current gender gap in OpenAI’s new board, is like a glaring neon sign signalling a bigger problem. The upheaval has left a reshaped, all male board overseeing the influential AI company. More board members will be appointed- let’s hope for a genuine impact over token representation. When I look at the AI sector as a whole, I see a persistent issue of underrepresentation of all diverse voices. AI is already known for its bias. It's crucial those voices play an equal part in the AI revolution, for the good of everyone. Let's build a tech future that's as diverse as the world it's meant to serve.

AI and Diversity - still a long way to go. OpenAI, the company that developed ChatGPT, is facing new challenges after the back and forth with its founder Sam Altman: the company's new board composition is apparently all male and is lacking diversity. As per a WIRED article, prominent female candidates who are well known in the world of AI have declined to join the board. There are many studies available that show that diverse boards are performing better than non-diverse boards. OpenAI is therefore well advised to seize the opportunity and compose a board with a variety of different views resulting from diversity in a lot of ways – not only gender. The AI industry needs more inclusivity, and OpenAI has the chance to set an example. https://lnkd.in/dFDnk-9v #ai #artificialintelligence #datalaw #dei #diversity #dlapiper #crossingnewhorizonstogether 

Can you name a female leader in technology? Most people can’t. Although her CEO days may be short lived, I trust that the Sam Altman fiasco will serve as an opportunity to recognize and remember the name Mira Murati, 34-year-old CTO who “has worked behind the scenes at OpenAI, overseeing the development and delivery of revolutionary products such as ChatGPT and DALL-E.”   **A March 2018 survey on #gender and #technology conducted by software company LivePerson found that only 8.3% of respondents said they could name at least one #femaleleader in technology. Of this group, only half could actually provide a name when asked to do so in a follow-up question. Of the group that ventured a name, one quarter listed Siri or Alexa as female technology leaders. (“I’d blush if I could” report, UNESCO 2019) #artificialintelligence #ai #openai #femaleleadership #tech

👉🏾 Exhibit No.10001 - The Glass Cliff ❗Some are hailing Mira Murati's appointment to interim CEO of OpenAI in the aftermath of Sam Altman's firing as a victory for women in tech and diversity. This type of wishful thinking is harmful to our progress on gender equity and equality. 🛑 Moving immensely qualified women into interim leadership positions to clean up the mess left behind after a crisis is NOT a win because it perpetuates the notion that women can only be "fixers" not leaders. 💡Researchers have named this barrier "The Glass Cliff", based on evidence that women have a better chance of breaking through the "Glass Ceiling" when an organization is facing a crisis. (https://lnkd.in/eABKvDnF) ⏱ Reminder to Silicon Valley that meritocracy means overcoming your biases and hiring women leaders as your FIRST choice not as an afterthought when things are going sideways. 💯 Update: As many have rightly pointed out in the comments, Silicon Valley is notorious for using women/diversity hires for PR value and to deflect criticism. Only time will tell if this is more window-dressing or a genuine attempt at reform. Either way, my original point still stands - stop claiming this is a win for women in AI/tech. #glasscliff #diversityinai #gender #bias #womenintech https://lnkd.in/eDb5meCc

You probably heard about the kerfuffle at OpenAI a couple weeks when Sam Altman was fired by the board on a Friday but back at the helm with a new board by the following Monday. All the women on the old board were replaced with white men. The women were interested in guardrails, safety, and ethical use of AI; the new board members are more interested in investing capital into commercial uses of AI. "The lack of women in the AI field has been an issue for years; in 2018, WIRED estimated that only 12 percent of leading machine learning researchers were women. In 2020, the World Economic Forum found that only 26 percent of data and AI positions in the workforce are held by women. 'AI is very imbalanced in terms of gender,' says Sasha Luccioni, an AI ethics researcher at HuggingFace. 'It’s not a very welcoming field for women.' One of the areas where women are flourishing within the AI industry is in the world of ethics and safety, which Luccioni views as comparatively inclusive." This article asks ominous questions about where AI is headed when women and people of color are underrepresented in the field and ethical considerations are not deemed as important as the commercial possibilities of the technology. https://lnkd.in/gNATentt #womeninai #representationmatters #GenderRepresentation

#DebateMate upskills to equip everyone everywhere with the skills lacking inthe all white all male board od #OpenAi #SamAltman you promised you represent #Humanity #StandUp for the humanskills #BeBetterHumans #keirstarmer #deepmind --#emotionalintelligence #leadershipdevelopment

It is with great joy that I am sharing this "Intro to ML" lesson led by fellow Women Techmakers Ambassador ChengCheng Tan. If you are looking for a 1-hour quickstart to better understand #MachineLearning this is a great place to begin. https://lnkd.in/gpfbsPw4

As usual, Kay Firth-Butterfield is spot on. One of the many problems that wretchedly biased NYT article failing to mention any of key women in AI show us, is there are not enough women on boards and in the C-suite. We are seeing "diversity and inclusivity fatigue" which is particularly problematic with a technology as impactful as AI. I have seen first hand how the auto industry devoid of equal number of women leaders has handicapped innovation, product development, and business. I know how hard it is to reverse toxic culture entrenched in bias, intentional or otherwise. I have worked in many ways to try and change the industry (see https://lnkd.in/gYMqdWdr) and know first hand how hard it is to push that boulder uphill. Transportation is hugely important to economic growth. And we all know AI will also become essential to economic growth. Let's all pull together now to fix this before it becomes as big a problem as it has been for decades in automotive. We need our male allies to join in this effort.