[2023 Women's Forum] "AI Learns from Male-Centered Data... Women's Role Crucial to Eliminating Bias"

Asia Economy Hosted '2023 Women Leaders Forum' AI Session
Discussion on 'AI Revolution, The Path Women Leaders Must Take'
Director Bae Sun-min, Center Head Oh Soon-young, Executive Director Kang Seo-young, Senior Executive Son Byung-hee, Former Super Labs CEO Jeon Jin-soo

"Diversity is a valuable asset not only for women but for everyone. Diversity is essential in developing and utilizing AI."

At the '2023 Asia Economy Women Leaders Forum' held on the 24th at Lotte Hotel in Sogong-dong, Seoul, female leaders in the AI field unanimously expressed this view. They emphasized that not only the AI industry but society as a whole must recognize the value of 'diversity' for more opportunities to open through AI.

Bae Soon-min, Head of KT Convergence Technology Institute, is presenting on the topic "AI Revolution, The Path Women Leaders Must Take" at the "2023 Asia Economy Women Leaders Forum" held on the 24th at Lotte Hotel in Jung-gu, Seoul. Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

According to Goldman Sachs, companies with at least one female executive saw their corporate value increase by 44% within one year after going public. This figure is higher than the 13% increase seen in companies without female executives. Morgan Stanley analyzed that companies with more women on their boards have a return on equity (ROE) 36.4% higher than those without.

On this day, Bae Soon-min, head of KT Convergence Technology Institute, who presented on the theme "AI Revolution, the Path Women Leaders Must Take," said, "Companies with fair and equal cultures have grown more," adding, "For companies to grow, they need to hire women and pay attention to compensation and incentives." Bae diagnosed that women's roles are necessary even in the AI era. With 81.5% of domestic companies complaining about a shortage of AI personnel, the importance of female talent is increasing.

The female leaders participating in the session agreed that AI could be a new opportunity for women. In KT's case, AI was introduced into counseling work, which has a high proportion of women. AI handles simple Q&A, passing on only tasks that require human interaction. This improved the efficiency of existing counselors' work by 15%. As a result, customer satisfaction also increased.

On the 24th, at Lotte Hotel in Jung-gu, Seoul, Bae Sun-min, Director of KT Convergence Technology Institute (from the left), Jeon Jin-su, former CEO of Super Labs, Oh Soon-young, Head of KB Kookmin Bank Financial AI Center, Kang Seo-young, Executive Director of CJ AI Center, and Son Byung-hee, Executive Director of Maum AI, are participating in an AI session discussion on the theme "AI Revolution, the Path Women Leaders Must Take" at the '2023 Asia Economy Women Leaders Forum'. Photo by Kim Hyun-min kimhyun81@

On the other hand, concerns were raised that if AI replaces jobs with a high proportion of women, such as counseling, women's opportunities could disappear. Kang Seo-young, executive director of CJ AI Center, pointed out, "Simple clerical jobs, where many women have entered, are exposed to automation," adding, "It is necessary to nurture female talent in new jobs or startups emerging in the AI era."

It is also an issue to consider that AI can reproduce biases against women. Jeon Jin-soo, former CEO of Superlabs and session moderator, raised the topic, saying, "If AI learns from reality, it may also learn biases against women or minorities as they are." For example, if generative AI is asked to draw a construction technician, it draws a man; if asked for a flight attendant, it draws a woman. The more AI that has learned such stereotypes is used, the more bias can be reinforced.

Oh Soon-young, head of KB Kookmin Bank Financial AI Center, emphasized, "Looking at the past Apple Card case, under the same conditions, men's loan limits were more than 10 times higher than women's," adding, "It is necessary to remove bias from the data AI learns from and improve accuracy." Executive Kang suggested, "A strategy to secure data on women and minorities is needed," and "Above all, more women should participate in AI research to detect bias."

On the 24th, at Lotte Hotel in Jung-gu, Seoul, Bae Sun-min, Director of KT Convergence Technology Institute (from the left), Jeon Jin-su, former CEO of Super Labs, Oh Soon-young, Head of KB Kookmin Bank Financial AI Center, Kang Seo-young, Executive Director of CJ AI Center, and Son Byung-hee, Executive Director of Maum AI, are participating in an AI session discussion on the theme "AI Revolution, the Path Women Leaders Must Take" at the '2023 Asia Economy Women Leaders Forum.' Photo by Kim Hyun-min kimhyun81@

Discussions on leadership and education needed in the AI era also continued. Session participants agreed that the role of leaders in relationships and collaboration remains important even in the AI era. Although AI handles mechanical and computational tasks, selecting valuable work and creating synergy effects is a human domain.

Regarding education, they predicted that learning methods could change significantly. Bae said, "In the past, there was the concept of a lifelong company and lifelong job, but AI is rapidly eliminating these concepts," defining it as "the era of lifelong learning." He explained that it is necessary to develop the ability to define problems and decide which problems to solve. Son Byung-hee, executive director of Mind AI, advised, "It is also necessary to maintain one's original nature, such as chatting and writing," but "we must study how to utilize AI well." Former CEO Jeon said, "The experience of growing while moving between large companies and startups itself was a learning process," adding, "In the AI era, opportunities for growth come from relationships with people."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.