We caught up with Laura Bates who is speaking at The Changemakers Conference Scotland on 29 October in Edinburgh.
AI is transforming how marketers reach and engage audiences — what are some of the hidden biases we risk reinforcing when using these tools?
We know that AI tools can unintentionally reproduce and intensify existing bias in the datasets they are trained on, so if using generative AI for content creation, for example, there is a risk of producing marketing materials that might foreground regressive gender or racial stereotypes, or fail to capture the real diversity of your audience. There's also a risk that similar bias in targeting tools can lead to important sections of your audience being missed, particularly when such tools are designed to exclude 'outliers' in the data.
From your perspective, what practical steps can organisations take to make sure their use of AI is inclusive, fair, and aligned with their brand values?
There are so many steps organisations can take towards ethical, sustainable AI usage, but it's vital to put these in place before adoption of AI tools, rather than attempt to make corrective tweaks along the way when potentially biased tools have already been embedded. Steps might include introducing audits of AI output, to regularly check unintended bias isn't resulting from AI tool usage, taking action to diversify and remove bias from large datasets on which AI tools are trained, and think carefully about making sure diverse teams are involved in building a roadmap to onboarding AI tools.
How can marketers and communicators play a role in shaping the responsible use of AI within their organisations — beyond compliance and policy?
Taking a considered and curious approach to AI rather than a headlong sense of urgency about needing to immediately jump on the bandwagon! Thinking about the wider impact of such tools on the workforce, including whether particular groups of employees are more significantly impacted by AI adoption, and finding ways to ensure AI tools are being used alongside human innovation and direction to enhance rather than replace human creative output.
Tickets are still available at The Changemakers Scotland Conference on 29 October - book here.
