Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Work: What Leaders Need to Know

In this interview, AI educator, Patricia Gestoso, shares her journey into artificial intelligence and explains why developing AI literacy and critical thinking will be essential as technology continues to shape the future of work.

How did you start working on AI?

My background is in chemical engineering. During my master’s, I realised I loved research but hated the lab, so my advisor offered me a chance to give computer simulation a go, as they had recently purchased software for it and nobody knew what to do with it. I loved it and I’ve never looked back.

After my master’s, I went to Canada to pursue a PhD in computational chemistry, then started working as a modelling engineer focused on developing new materials.

Then, more than twenty years ago, I joined a medium size software company focused on scientific modelling as a trainer. I knew the company and some of its products very well. I had been their customer for years.

One of the applications I taught customers used what we called at the time “statistics” to predict the properties of new materials. Some of those “statistical methods” were neural networks and genetic algorithms, part of the field of artificial intelligence. At the time, those methods were already popular among life science researchers but they were not very helpful to materials modellers  –  my customers. Why? Because large, good datasets were scarce for materials.

As a point in case, I still remember a specific customer who was excited about using the algorithms to develop new materials in their organisation. With a sinking feeling from similar conversations, I asked him, “How many data points do you have?” He said, “I think I have 7 or 10 in a spreadsheet.” Unfortunately, I had to inform him that it was not nearly enough.

After such a less-than-amazing start at teaching artificial intelligence, you’d have thought I was done. I thought so, too. But I’ve changed my mind. It hasn’t happened overnight though. It has taken two decades of experience teaching, using AI tools to deliver successful customer projects, and supporting AI applications in my corporate job.

In parallel, over the last 10 years, I have spearheaded several DEI initiatives, especially around gender equality. That led me to examine how AI reproduced and scaled biases and even was weaponised against women and certain groups.

As a consequence, I began collaborating with NGOs to raise awareness of the benefits and challenges of AI and to produce e-learning resources that foster critical thinking, including the impact of AI on sustainability.

With the release of ChatGPT, women at the executive and board level reached out to me because they wanted to learn about AI but felt that the courses out there were for people with already a knowledge of AI or that they were not comprehensive enough – they focused on the mechanics of writing prompts but not on how AI would impact work, or sustainability, or governance.

That led me to broaden my coaching business, which I developed in parallel to my corporate job, to also help leaders and organisations to leverage AI for sustainable and responsible growth through training, public speaking, and consultancy.

Seeing that there has been a growing gap in AI adoption in recent years, I decided last year to launch an online AI literacy program for women leaders, Women Leading with AI: Master the Tools, Shape the Future, an eight-session virtual group program focused on inclusive, sustainable and actionable AI for women leaders. I’ve run two cohorts and the next starts on April 14^th.