i&a: Tell me about your journey into the entrepreneurial space?

Rose: My journey really started when I got into the tech and startup space. It’s fast-moving. There are different challenges if you join a company really early. There’s not a lot of structure, there’s a lot of flexibility. There’s a lot of room to grow and try things. That worked really well until about 2022. It was a really tough year for tech. There were layoffs constantly, everywhere, from every size company, Spotify down to your small startup. That’s when I decided to take a chance on entrepreneurship. I’d been thinking about it for a long time. I always had some sort of freelance side gig. This time I was going into it full-time.

i&a: Can you give us a summary of AI from your point of view?

Rose: Artificial Intelligence is machine learning, a machine that mimics human behaviour, and human decision-making. There are different types of AI. The AI that we hear about a lot today is generative AI, thanks to the rise of chatbots. But there’s also the long-standing AI that we’ve had for decades, which is predictive AI. More recently you have generative AI. What’s kind of coming on the horizon is autonomous and agentic AI, which is really exciting and fascinating. I really do think of AI as machines that mimic human intelligence, and human behaviour.

i&a: What do you do in this space?

Rose: There’s this balance of using this really cool, exciting and valuable technology and then considering the ethical implications of doing so. I work in both worlds. I think that’s important because when we’re having conversations about ethics around AI or machine learning, there’s a need to have practical experience to really add context. To ensure it’s not a purely philosophical conversation.

i&a: How do human values play a role in AI?

Rose: It’s hard to have a very clear idea of human values because there are so many different value systems and beliefs. This is part of the ethics conversation where we talk about making sure that not only the developers reflect diversity but also that the data is reflecting diversity. There is such a concentration of companies that are producing or creating AI models in the West and in America and are run by a certain archetype of person. We are really risking that we are impressing the values of a subset of the population on everybody through these systems.

i&a: That’s scary to think about. Do you think we’ll get on top of this?

Rose: That is a great question. Given the trajectory so far, it feels unlikely, but if we don’t try then it will absolutely not happen. There is this responsibility that we have as a society to voice concerns, to really speak up, to be active in the shaping of the way that AI continues to grow and become prevalent in all areas of our lives.

i&a: What would you say to a parent trying to navigate AI with their children?

Rose: It’s a natural response to be apprehensive about it. There’s value in acknowledging that change is hard and it takes time. So when I think about parents, especially with young children, I really like to frame this in a way where it’s around parental responsibility. Your parental responsibility to protect and to really take care of your children. If you are not educating yourself on this technology and becoming familiar with it, you cannot then educate your children. It can create very smart digital citizens, so to speak, and so if not for yourself, then for your children. Step out of your comfort zone because it’s not going away. And your children are going to be exposed to it, whether you’re comfortable with it or not. The best thing you can do is educate yourself so you can better support them.

i&a: You’ve spoken about having a future mindset. How would you culture and encourage somebody to have that mindset?

Rose: Coaching somebody to have that type of mindset is so unique to each individual because there’s different levels of comfort around change. There’s different levels around comfort of risk, which is a really important consideration. One thing that I love about future thinking and strategic foresight is that there is this idea of futures with an “s”. There is no prescribed future. There’s no on future that’s fixed that we’re walking towards every single day. We’re making decisions that change and lead us to different versions of that future and that’s true in a micro sense, in terms of everyday life, but also on a macro sense, in terms of our larger world, our larger society. That framing can be helpful for people to perhaps address some fear or some discomfort around not knowing what the future is going to hold. Shifting the framing to what type of future do I want to see? What do I want the future to be like and what things can I do today to make that more probable? Reminding people of their agency, of their power, of their influence and impact is so pivotal in encouraging that future focused mindset.

i&a: What was the defining moment for you to shift and become a thought leader in this space?

Rose: I wish I could pinpoint the exact moment. It was kind of a convergence. I started to spend time around machine learning engineers and people that are focused on AI. I started to really see how these folks were influencing and impacting this area. Very tangibly, changing the way that models and systems were being created and deployed. This work that they’re doing is actually making an impact. Then I saw and advert and it said, “What are we gonna do with all this future?”. On some random day all of these thoughts converged together, and I thought to myself, well, what actually is going to happen? What are we actually going to do with the future? Then I realized that there are many possible futures. There’s so many ways to live. I’ve always wanted to live an unconventional life. There is no one path or way that things need to be. Had those folks not been focused on AI safety, we could have seen more dangerous models already. And so it was the convergence of all these experiences and concepts and belief systems that I’ve held for a long time that sparked this idea to start my podcast.

i&a: Tell us about why you started your podcast.

Rose: Once I started to talk to people it started to extend my mind. It struck me during this transformation journey that I was experiencing a bit of an echo chamber in terms of, I was following so many people in the AI space, I was going to these AI events and everybody was talking about the same things. People are in their own echo chambers and perhaps are not really exposing themselves as frequently as they could or should to different ideas. This encouraged me even more to start having conversations around what might the future look like. I want to really stretch people’s minds. I want people to think outside the box. I want to push people out of their comfort zone. All of that together is what encouraged the Futures focused thinking.

i&a: What advice would you give to somebody who’s trying to get into the space?

Rose: Set aside some time each week to read, to explore different tools or events. Find a community. I think that’s really helpful and valuable. You never know who you’re going to meet. I would also say specific to AI, given the nature of the beast, you need to make a decision. There is a very technical side of AI which is increasingly becoming more important, but there’s also this other side, a very human-driven, human connection focused side. The more AI proliferates our world, interacting with it every day, there’s going to be a resurgence of a desire to connect with people on a human level. If you’re not very technically inclined, there’s still this great opportunity for you to really lean heavily into that human side. People can capitalize on this great shift that’s happening even without necessarily being a coder or being an engineer. That’s the advice I would give.

i&a: Where would you suggest people start?

Rose: I would suggest starting with a chatbot, whether it’s chat GPT or it’s Gemini or Claude, there’s so many, go to the web page, open it up and ask it a question. Ask a question that you would ask your spouse, your sister or your friend. Don’t try too hard to think of the right question to ask. Generative AI uses natural language, which means language that you and I use, a very human-based, comfortable language that you’re already familiar with. You already know how to communicate with natural language. Start to play around with the tool by asking it some questions and spending a couple of minutes a day. It doesn’t have to be daunting. Get started. Be model or system or tool agnostic. This technology moves so quickly, get comfortable being uncomfortable.

i&a: What has been the hardest thing you’ve had to face?

Rose: Myself. My mindset. Overcoming my own fears, my own doubts about my abilities. Entrepreneurship is one of those experiences that you cannot truly know unless you’ve experienced it yourself. This idea of eating what you kill in a very primal sense, in a way, survival-based framing that many people have never experienced and will never experience. You really have to experience it for yourself to understand. I think people who become entrepreneurs become entrepreneurs for a reason. Once you get a taste of it, it is hard to go back.

i&a: What has surprised you the most in your career to date?

Rose: Returning to who I was at some point took a detour. I’d stopped doing things that I enjoyed. This year was really about what I call coming home to myself. I’m rediscovering things about myself that I’ve always loved. I don’t even know when I left this space, but somehow it’s coming back around to it. The surprising thing for me is that it was triggered by this desire to do my own thing, full-time, as an entrepreneur. I don’t know if it was because there needed to be this discomfort or this challenge or this struggle. Finding the resilience that was required to reactivate all of these things.

i&a: Is there anything you would have done differently?

Rose: I don’t think anything is a coincidence. I don’t believe in regrets. I do believe that everything happens as it needs to, as it should, and that’s why I’m here at this time. If I was going to mess with the fabric of life, I’d say, to go back and continue my legal education. What I will say is that door is never closed to me.

i&a: 5–10 years from now, where are you?

Rose: I am internationally travelling, speaking and teaching people about ethics in AI, specifically in technology. More opportunities to educate people.

i&a: What does legacy mean to you and what would you want yours to be?

Rose: I haven’t started to think about legacy much. I feel like I’m still really in a building phase, but I think I would want people to remember me or think of my legacy as somebody who is very memorable in terms of the way that I interact with people, the way I conduct myself, the way I cultivate conversations. I guess the idea of legacy, leaving a lasting impact. Being somebody who opened their eyes or their mind to something that they hadn’t really considered before.

i&a: What’s inspiring you right now?

Rose: I am very inspired by the conversation around a post-labour economy and this fourth industrial revolution, this idea of humans flourishing. When we are no longer worried about working and trading our labour for capital. What the world could look like, how we might be spending our time, what sorts of things we might be getting up to. I think about the futures, there are so many different versions for potential futures that could be a reality. Nobody has the answer, so it’s speculative, but it’s an interesting, fun and necessary thought experiment.

i&a: What would you caution people to think about?

Rose: I would caution people to think about how we can take care of our environment while enjoying this new technology that is so resource-intensive. It’s actually pulling us backwards in terms of our commitments, in terms of the progress that we’ve made on a lot of sustainability commitments and goals. How can we have the best of both worlds? I like to remind people, we still live in the physical world. If we’re not able to breathe clean air, if we’re not able to access clean fresh water, these systems…they are not in the physical world. They’re machines. They’re computer systems. They don’t care. We need to remember to make the environment a priority. These tech giants have a very clear agenda. They really have the ear of our legislators and our regulators.

i&a: Work-life balance. What does that mean to you?

Rose: Work-life balance, I don’t think I subscribe to that concept. For me specifically, balance is not something I can articulate in percentages. I think of entrepreneurship as a lifestyle and therefore my perspective on it is very different than somebody who has a job or you know, something they do during certain hours. I am in a position to make decisions and they only affect me. My life is likely radically different than somebody else who has a different life and different responsibilites.

i&a: If you could ask a coach anything right now, what would it be?

Rose: If there was a cheat sheet on how to sustain a really positive and momentous mindset. How do I keep that turned on 24/7? I’m not sure that they’d have that answer, but I’d certainly ask them. I think it’s so pivotal, I think it’s so important. If there’s a potion in a bottle, I’m ready for it.

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impact&agency