Women and AI: it’s time to get involved
As a few brilliant women campaign for responsible AI, it’s time for the rest of us to explore the greatest technological innovation of the 21st century.
Like fire in the Stone Age and electricity in the 19th Century, artificial intelligence (AI) is a general-purpose technology set to alter society and the economy. Quite how it will do so is not yet certain – it’s a future that remains to be written.
With AI evolving at lightning speed, women are playing a key part in urging for it to make a better future. Among others, a female tech executive, a philosopher and a lawyer are all pushing for this powerful technology to have a positive impact on the world.
But for women as a whole AI can already change your daily life, so you need to explore and learn what AI can do for you. Not everyone can influence the future but you’ve much to gain from simply looking into what AI has to offer, especially in healthcare and daily administration.
What’s AI and what will it do?
AI is developing fast, exceeding expectations. A form of machine intelligence, it processes massive amounts of data through algorithms that recognise patterns and perform tasks such as reasoning, learning and decision-making. Most recently, ‘agentic AI’ has been the breakthrough of 2026, independently carrying out multi-step tasks.
In finance, AI-linked stock offerings such as SpaceX, OpenAI and Anthropic are setting markets alight, with other likely investment beneficiaries in sectors like healthcare, transport and finance. To give you an idea of AI’s huge potential, the global market is estimated at more than $4 trillion by 2035, an annual growth rate of 18.7% from 2026, according to Precedence Research.1
As AI advances it may raise economic productivity, galvanise drug discovery and optimise energy consumption. Less positively, though, it’s displacing workers in areas such as software development, fuelling fears of unemployment. Further, there’s a risk of it equipping surveillance states.
Female voices, female uses
Returning though to the women seeking to make AI a force for good, Meredith Whittaker, a tech executive, is a vocal critic of the potential harms of agentic AI; Shoshana Zuboff, a philosopher and author, flags up the dangers of surveillance capitalism; Kay Firth-Butterfield, a lawyer, advocates for responsible AI.
While AI’s big impacts will take years to play out, it’s already improving women’s health every day. You can wear a ring that tracks biometric data and provides insights into your menstrual cycles, pregnancy and menopause. Beyond that, a sanitary towel predicts ovarian cancer, while an algorithm detects patterns of endometriosis years in advance.
And with women still shouldering most of the burden of managing households, new tools may soon lighten the load. A paper from the US Brookings Institute identifies AI-powered executive assistants, robots and autonomous vehicles as innovations with the potential to make a big difference to your daily life.2
Join our network
AI is not just about machines or algorithms. It’s about how we choose to use it – to create more time, more clarity, and ultimately, more control.
Join our Beyond Value community to explore these ideas further, connect with other women shaping their own perspectives, and be part of the conversation about what comes next.
Important Information
Information correct as of 3 July 2026.
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