AI Impact: Secure Gender and Intergenerational Support for Leaders, Consumers
AI use presents challenges and more training is needed.
With YouTube’s recent announcement offering a banquet of creative tools for creators, it is impossible to deny the AI revolution is deepening influence for leaders, users, institutions and cultures around the world across generations, identities and genders.
Everyone needs to pay attention to this world-shifting tool.
A new study, the AI Big Bang 2025, researching AI use and media coverage, finds that ChatGPT takes up more than half the industry in use with 46.59 billion visits from August 2024 to July 2025, and 2.4 million media mentions. In July 2025 alone, there were 636, 000 chatbot visits ,by consumers to all tool providers.
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The study reports that Grok is the fastest growing with “near-zero traffic the prior year to 686.91 million visits” in 2024-2025.
This is even as the tech industry experienced enormous layoffs in August of 6,002 employees, thankfully down from 16,142 in July, and not near the April numbers of 24,500, according to Tech Crunch.
More recently, “OpenAI and Nvidia have signed a letter of intent for a strategic partnership to deliver at least 10 gigawatts of computing power for OpenAI's next-generation AI data centers,” The Decoder reports. For context, the size of the output of these data centers are equal to 10 nuclear reactors. The value of the deal is approximately $100 billion.
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Perhaps the most significant illumination of the AI industry is the enormous gender gap in AI employment and leadership. According to Diginomica, “When interface analyzed data on nearly 1.6 million AI professionals worldwide, it found stark gender imbalances, mirrored across the wider technology sector. Women account for only 22% of AI talent globally, and fewer than 14% of senior executive roles in AI.”
“New study @Diginomica shows “stark gender imbalance across tech sector. Women= 22% AI talent globally, and fewer than 14% senior executive roles in AI.” @takeleadwomen #genderimbalance #tech #AI ”
The gap is fueled by lack of skills and training in AI for women in tech. The gender disparity in tech is historic, and in spite of a number of successful women pioneers in AI, the gap of women and men is pronounced at about one-quarter of the AI industry for women and 75% of men. The reasons for that are multifactorial, but the effort to close the gap can be a singular push.
Chelsea Hopkins, Social Media and PR Manager at Fasthosts, tells Diginomica, “Despite the gender disparity in AI, women have already been crucial in the development of the AI era. However, when AI is scanning the internet in real-time for data, women’s voices are not platformed as easily, as they are marginalized in conversations in the STEM sphere due to underrepresentation in the workforce.”
But it is critical to look beyond the numbers and to what it all means. The impact of AI on the economy, culture and individuals is undeniable. The adaptation of AI tools is expanding to nearly every workplace in every industry.
Making sure there is fairness across the AI universe as it pertains to gender, age, race, identity, socioeconomics and geography is crucial. So far it is not going that well.
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Digital Journal recently reports that onboarding for employees is tainted by AI bias, eliminating applicants automatically for using certain words on their resume. For instance, AI “downgraded applicants with the word ‘women’ on their resume, or rewarded those who mentioned ‘baseball’ over ‘softball.’ Others favored names like Thomas, or flagged applicants based on postal codes. These data points often reflect gender, race, or socioeconomic status, whether intentionally or not.
“AI “downgraded applicants with the word ‘women’, ‘softball’ or certain postal codes, reflecting gender, race, or socioeconomic status.” @DigitalJournal @takeleadwomen ”
At a recent tech conference in Toronto, Hilke Schellmann, author of The Algorithm and Assistant Professor of Journalism at New York University, said, “There’s no evidence [these tools] find the most qualified candidates.” Digital Journal reports. She told the audience, “In one survey of C-suite leaders, they found that 90 percent of leaders using AI tools know their software rejected qualified applicants.”
Yes, gatekeeping for the next level of candidate consideration is important, but not if it is flawed by discrimination.
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Bizjournals reports that local Puget Sound women leaders in tech, the Bizwomen Leadership Council, agree AI is a help as well as a hindrance in achieving equity and inclusion in leadership and workforces, as well as personal finances.
A new Ipsos study found “nearly 40% of Americans are already using AI-powered tools to manage personal finance tasks.” On the professional side, “While nearly all companies have invested in AI, only 1% believe their systems have reached maturity, according to recent McKinsey research,” Bizjournals reports.
Harvard Business Review recently reported, “Economic turmoil, workplace churn, and the continuing rise of AI have added new stress to workplaces around the world. Uncertainty can encourage tunnel vision,” writes Jamil Zaki, a Stanford University psychologist.
“Leaders focus only on what will keep the bottom line alive this quarter and think of investing in people as a luxury for better days. This is backwards. The least certain times are when it matters most to connect with people, sharing a vision and the core values that remain unchanged,” Zaki writes.
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In a recent event for their new book, Wired Wisdom: How To Age Better Online, co-authors Eszter Hargittai and John Palfrey, offered insights and dispelled myths about the biggest generational group of digital consumers—those adults over 60. Their research discoveries pertain not to social media use, but also to AI use.
“In their new book, Wired Wisdom: How To Age Better Online, co-authors @Eszter Hargittai and @MacFound president John Palfrey dispelled myths re digital consumers over 60. “Some are extremely savvy.”
“Some over 60 are extremely savvy,” said Hargittai, Chair in Internet Use & Society in the Department of Communication and Media Research at the University of Zurich. “Digital inequalities signal how social inequality reflects that age is what matters the most.” She added, “Older adults are not a siloed group or a silenced group.”
Whether viewing an older leader in management or a senior colleague, the presumption that they are not fluent in digital literacy is debunked.
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Palfrey, president of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, and co-author, said, “Older adults are more skeptical, but also subject to more sophisticated scams. Cybersecurity and AI training is even more important for them.” He added, “It is important for people in the workforce to have IT and Ai training experiences.”
“Multi- generational use of technology has such a connection to well-being,” Palfrey said. . “The life of the mind is key to wellbeing.”
In his 2011 book, Intellectual Property Strategy, Palfrey writes, “Strategies grounded in openness and connectedness of others (in technical terms, interoperability) can offer surprising benefits to those who are willing to experiment with new approaches.”
Many are observing this clue to make AI use access available to all workforce participants, not just younger employees.
“The adoption of AI in the workplace has forced everybody to learn new skills, whether young graduates or baby boomers. Yet, access to learning these new skills is not equal. A recent study by Randstad highlighted the issue of providing AI training,” according to Futuriot.
According to Futuriot, “While 75% of companies are adopting AI, only 35% of talent had received AI training in the last year, with a male/female split of 71%/29% for AI-skilled workers.”
There is also assumption bias for older women and men, the study shows. “Only 22% of Baby Boomers were offered AI skills training compared with 28% of Gen X and 45% of Gen Z workers. So, older workers are at a disadvantage in maintaining relevant skills.”
Futuriot reports, “In Randstad's report, women working for around 30 years account for only 21% of talent with AI skills; in Generative AI, this is 24%, and in Deep Learning, this is 15%.”
Much more training across generations, gender and identity needs to take place.
“CEO of Twin Protocol @StaceyEngle, founder @AuthorityLab, @takeleadwomen board member: “In this AI era, the data is the land and the ownership is the gold rush. ”
Speaking at the recent Take The Lead Power Up conference, Stacey Engle, CEO of Twin Protocol, founder of Authority Lab, and Take The Lead board member, said “In this AI era, the data is the land and the ownership is the gold rush.”
