How to Build a Career in Responsible Tech

"Technologists need better and more frequent cross-pollination with those in public policy, starting in the classroom. In business school, aspiring entrepreneurs should be encouraged to take introductory public policy classes. Tech startups should look favorably on job candidates with an interest or experience in public policy. Tech companies of al... See more

if we want to be good founders and good technologists, I think one moral responsibility you have is the realization that whatever you build will affect people in unintended consequences.

How might you educate those leaders? How can you be the best steward of technology, but also be the best utilizer of technology?

The tendency to think of A.I. as a magical problem solver is indicative of a desire to avoid the hard work that building a better world requires. That hard work will involve things like addressing wealth inequality and taming capitalism. For technologists, the hardest work of all—the task that they most want to avoid—will be questioning the assumpt

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As we fight to shape today’s technological landscape, I think we have a special obligation to fight for the people who stand to lose the most from AI and automation, including historically marginalized communities and people who don’t have much of a safety net. I also think we need to resist the urge to push the AI conversation too far into the fut... See more

Young technologists are building a new future on a new set of values. Their values are informed by the first-hand experience of growing up with the perverse incentives of yesterday’s social media and a genuine desire to create a better world — online and off.”

A technologist makes reason out of the messiness of the world, leverages their understanding to envision a different reality, and builds a pathway to make their vision happen. All three of these endeavors—to try to understand the world, to imagine something different, and to build something that fulfills that vision—are deeply human.

We have a moral responsibility to shape the world with specific, defensible ideas that we believe in. Call it definite optimism, reclaiming agency, or finding your life's work. Building a great business, rallying a network, fostering a community – they all require redirecting collective attention. The technologist's job is not to redirect worship t... See more

Climate activists can help us avoid the trap of “platform determinism”—that is, the risk of fetishizing the platforms as mythically powerful actors, instead of centering the choices made by the humans who design the platforms. Such activists also bring expertise in movement building: they know how to put pressure on investors and companies, and how... See more