What happens when creative instincts meet the raw speed of modern AI?
We sit down with Ruth, a fractional VP of Experience Design at Merkle, to pull apart tokenism, dataset bias, and the surprising ways new tools let underrepresented voices ship credible work at record pace. From her early days translating human behaviour into digital products to today’s “vibe coded” prototypes, Ruth shows how design and development are converging – and why that matters for women building influence in tech.
We get specific about bias. Voice assistants that normalize female servility, facial recognition systems that misidentify dark‑skinned women at alarming rates, and the now infamous resume screener that quietly learned to down-rank anything coded as “female.” These aren’t PR headlines; they are failures of data and diversity at the source. We unpack how procurement and recruiting pipelines can amplify those flaws if teams automate first-pass reviews without guardrails, and we make the case for representative datasets, transparent evaluation, and human-in-the-loop decisions.
There’s hope and direction here too. We highlight the Dove x Pinterest initiative that retrains beauty algorithms toward inclusivity while building ethical first-party data, and we discuss the tensions created by synthetic influencers that blur truth and raise impossible standards. Ruth’s take on sponsorship – active coaching, not just name-dropping – offers a blueprint for allyship that actually changes rooms. And we look at AI’s levelling effect for newcomers: when the cost of trying falls, fresh ideas get to market faster, especially inside teams that pair deep experience with modern tools.
If you care about inclusive AI, fair hiring, and the future of work for women in tech, this conversation gives you examples, language, and next steps you can use today. Subscribe, share with a colleague who needs this perspective, and leave a quick review telling us which takeaway you’ll put into practice next.
