In the midst of hype around AI increasing productivity or stealing jobs , there is one role that many women would be more than happy for it to take on: the mental load of managing a family. 

The need for innovation in coping with the mental load of family admin is never more apparent than at the beginning of the school year. The sheer volume of work required to keep our lives in check is utterly overwhelming. It is no wonder parents are burning out.

It is baffling that when it comes to the multitude of apps, emails, WhatsApps and group chats for our home lives, many parents have no help beyond a shared calendar on the fridge.

I even commonly hear that parents just switch off all notifications on WhatsApp and push school emails to a different inbox folder just to try and ease the mental load by not reading it at all.

In my professional life, the prospect of AI to increase our personal productivity, that of our teams, and even our products was intriguing and exciting.

Faced with stark differences between what was available professionally and the lack of options at home, my co-founder and husband, Mike Fraser, and I knew that needed to change.

Technology is creating overwhelm

In my household, Mike and I share the “doing” work of parenting quite evenly, but when it comes to things like Book Week, what’s happening when, and joining all the dots, that’s on me. 

Statistics prove I’m not alone. It is disproportionately women who hold 70% of the household mental load and are burning out from the sheer volume of life admin required to manage kids. Almost 50 per cent say there isn’t enough time to get everything done.

In 2021, the AIFS survey asked 2920 people, “who in your household plans and coordinates activities relating to your children?”. It found almost no instances of the male taking this on – being the one who usually or always does it, while only 1 in 5 households shared the mental load.

Innovating to solve this, even at least partly, is important. It is why CEOs have personal assistants, and why Annabel Crabb’s The Wife Drought is still relevant 10 years after she wrote it.

Starting and then exiting same-day flower delivery business LVLY, and now launching Goldee, the AI assistant for parents, I can say with conviction that the work of managing a family is akin to running a business.

If we can innovate for even small productivity gains in the workplace, we need to do the same to give back time and headspace to the parents who are simply struggling to keep up with technology that was supposed to help them. Parents need personal assistants, too – and that’s where AI presents exciting opportunities.

How AI can give parents back time

Solutions are thin on the ground. A simple internet search on easing the mental load provides vague help such as “practice self-care” (with what free time?) and “physically writing down everything in your head and delegating” (again, with that free time?!).

As AI becomes mainstream, there is a global focus on governance and risks including gender bias within AI, noting that the technology will hold the same bias as its programmers. The kind of products being developed using AI often reflect the dominance of men in the technology space. I believe it is important that the huge gains to be had using AI are also focused on reducing inequalities.

We don’t claim that the AI we’re developing at Goldee will make the mental load completely vanish (sorry!). But AI tools can and should be created so that  any parent can easily take the lead and start forwarding kid-related activities to an AI personal assistant for busy families. This is the kind of innovation that will help  shift the weight and make the invisible load visible.

As with productivity tools in the workplace the hidden volume of work, appointments and organisation, and all those tiny to-dos that normally get carried around in the woman’s head will be extracted and put into an action list, ready for anyone to help with.

Importantly, AI created by women to solve our unique problems means we will have tools to stop us from feeling like it’s easier to just keep doing everything ourselves.

That means more time for doing things we enjoy, more time to connect with our partners (rather than fight over who did what), and more time to spend with our kids rather than on your phone trying to find that piece of info. And that’s an AI-driven future all parents can get on board with.

Goldee is currently in limited release and available to parents with an invite code – parents that would like to be invited can head to Goldee.ai to get their invite.

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On Tuesday, the Victorian MP from the Animal Justice Party called out the Australian media outlet for editing an image that enlarged her breasts and made her outfit more revealing.

Nine News director Hugh Nailon claimed there was no staff member involved in editing the image and it was artificial intelligence (AI) that altered the picture whilst they were re-sizing the photo.

However, as reported by Guardian Australia, Adobe, creator of Photoshop, has confirmed the incident could not have occurred without “human intervention”.

“Any changes to this image would have required human intervention and approval,” the statement read.

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AI-edited images and deepfakes

AI-edited media content, such as images and videos, disproportionately targets and affects women, particularly high-profile women. This week alone, Georgie Purcell is not the first woman to have an image of herself altered in a sexist way.

Over the weekend, sexually explicit deepfake images of Taylor Swift were circulated on the social media platform X. Formerly known as Twitter, X Corp. responded to the incident on Sunday night by removing the images and the account that first published the deepfakes, as well as temporarily blocking users’ ability to search “Taylor Swift” on the platform.

According to a report from The New York Times, one of the several images that were in circulation was viewed 47 million times before the deepfake, along with the account that published it, was removed from X.

On Wednesday morning, Georgie Purcell spoke on ABC’s RN Breakfast about the rise in AI technologies targeting women and girls.

“This has happened to me this week, it also actually happened to Taylor Swift this week with deep fake [images] using AI, happening to her all over Twitter on a much larger scale,” Purcell said.

“I think we need to seriously consider that our laws are probably not keeping pace with emerging technologies like AI and the risks they pose not just women in public life, but everyday women as well.

“I’ve heard stories from young women who have had just enough photos on their Instagram profiles for them to be taken and altered to appear naked without their consent. and it’s deeply deeply concerning.”

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Earlier this month, the government released its interim response to the Safe and Responsible AI in Australia consultation, outlining its short-term action plan for the growing technology.

Although the interim response paper mentions general “bias and discriminatory outputs” that currently exist in AI, there is no specific mention of women or considering AI with a gender lens.

‘No way to represent a woman.’

On Tuesday, Premier Jacinta Allan told reporters there’s still “a long way to go” in the representation of women in the media, including in social media, after Purcell called out Nine News’ distorted image.

“That’s no way to represent any woman, let alone a woman who holds a position in public office, represents a community and is in the public discourse every single day,” Allan told reporters.

“It’s another reminder that everyone who has the opportunity to be part of the public debate to consider how men and women, but in this instance particularly women, are represented.”

In 2022, Raise Our Voice Australia released a report on the impact of the media on young women and gender diverse people’s aspirations to enter politics.

In that report, 87 per cent of respondents felt that representation of women in politics by the media was mostly negative.

Nearly half (47 per cent) were less likely to pursue a career in politics given the events of the last 12 months, which at the time of the report’s release, included the allegations of Bruce Lehrmann raping Brittany Higgins in parliament house, the allegations against former Attorney-General Christian Porter, the ABC’s program Ms Represented and much more.

The Victorian Premier said the incident involving Georgie Purcell sends another discouraging message to young women wanting to enter politics, something that needs urgent attention.

“We know it can, young women tell us that themselves and that’s why again, it’s important to both call it out, which I think is what’s happening here this morning,” Allan said.

“It’s important to call it out, to identify, to do better and to understand that we have come a long way, but we’ve still got a way to go.”

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The AI-based sewerage system maintenance business was backed by Dutch water technology specialist VC PureTerra Ventures, supported by US engineering and construction software giant Autodesk.

“As a women-led start-up, we understand the unique hurdles women face in leadership and funding, and we’re thrilled for VAPAR to be part of the positive change,” the company tells Women’s Agenda.

“We hope that we can inspire other women and the start-up support network to continue backing women and providing a diversified space for all entrepreneurs to drive change.”

Co-founded in 2018 by two engineers, Amanda Siqueira and Michelle Aguilar, the innovative startup was inspired by Siquiera’s experience as an engineering intern. She would manually review sewer inspection videos for 8-hours a day, an error-prone and subjective process that ignited the idea for a streamlined, tech-driven, AI-based solution.

“VAPAR’s technology unlocks the necessary efficiencies in pipeline investment decision-making,” Siqueira said. 

“Billions are spent every year by global water utilities on fixing their pipes, over half of which is spent in North America. Despite the massive investment, there isn’t enough data and dollars available – utilities must commit to doing things differently.” 

“Artificial intelligence can unlock unprecedented efficiencies. Our vision is to create a world where critical infrastructure investment meets the needs of our communities.”

Over 3 billion feet of sewer pipes are inspected globally each year, according to VAPAR, with sewer overflows and flooding becoming more common as a result of aging pipes, climate change and growing populations. 

VAPAR currently serves water authorities in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand, with a multi-regional team of 17 members. 

With this new $5 million investment, the company plans to build on its established customer base in these regions as well as fuel further expansion across North America to transform aging infrastructure. 

“The face of AI is changing rapidly, and we’re proud to be pioneering this deep learning technology in such an impactful way for the water industry,” said Aguilar.

“With our increasing customer base, we now support a wide range of industry standards, time zones and languages. Investing funds to double our team, add new verticals and start our North American office will ramp the number of customers that can benefit from this technology.”

For the past four years, VAPAR’s revenue and product usage has doubled annually. 

Alex Crowell, Partner at PureTerra Ventures, praised the startup’s performance, calling it a “standout in the evolving water management technology space”. 

“Showcasing their strong customer advocacy, a quick-to-adopt product and an impact-driven team made our decision an easy one,” he said, referring to their backing of the company.

“This investment will not only expand VAPAR’s customer reach but also substantially reduce pipe failures, which reflects our shared commitment to sustainable water infrastructure development globally.”

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X Corp. (formerly known as Twitter) responded to the incident on Sunday night by removing the images and the account that first published the deepfakes, as well as temporarily blocking users’ ability to search “Taylor Swift” on the platform.

“This is a temporary action and done with an abundance of caution as we prioritise safety on this issue,” said Joe Benarroch, head of business operations at X.

The pop star’s name is still blocked on X, resulting in an error when trying to search her name.

According to a report from The New York Times, one of the several images that were in circulation was viewed 47 million times before the deepfake, along with the account that published it, was removed from X.

In a news briefing on Friday, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre called on Congress to take legislative action against the abuse and misuse of AI technologies online, but also urged social media platforms to take greater measures to regulate content.

“This is very alarming. And so, we’re going to do what we can to deal with this issue,” Jean-Pierre said.

“We know that lax enforcement disproportionately impacts women and they also impact girls, sadly, who are the overwhelming targets.

“We believe they (the platforms) have an important role to play in enforcing their own rules to prevent the spread of misinformation and non-consensual, intimate imagery of real people.”

The creation and distribution of deepfake AI images has been widely regarded as a form of gender-based violence, as it disproportionately targets women and girls online.

In 2019, a study by Deeptrace, a cyber security company, found 96 per cent of deepfake videos online were of an intimate or sexual nature. The people depicted in the AI-generated content were primarily women actors, musicians and media professionals.

‘Extremely harmful content’

Australia’s eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant spoke to Women’s Agenda, explaining how easy it is to create deepfakes and how devastating it can be for people.

“Deepfakes, especially deepfake pornography, can be devastating to the person whose image is hijacked and altered without their knowledge or consent, no matter who they are,” Commissioner Inman Grant said.

“Image-based abuse, including deepfake porn, is persistent online harm which also represents one of the most egregious invasions of privacy.”

Generative AI is user-friendly and widely accessible to people. Inman Grant said something that would previously have taken large software and computing power to generate now can be generated with a click of a button.

“As a result, it’s becoming harder and harder to tell the difference between what’s real and what’s fake. And it’s much easier to inflict great harm,” Inman Grant said.

Australia’s online safety regulatory body, eSafety, lists the use of AI to create sexually explicit deepfake images as “image-based abuse”. Online users can report image-based abuse on eSafety’s website.

While eSafety has a 90 per cent success rate in getting deepfakes and other abusive material down from online sites, including social media platform X, Commissioner Inman Grant called on the “purveyors and profiteers of AI” to do more.

“We’re not going to regulate or litigate our way out of this – the primary digital safeguards must be embedded at the design phase and throughout the model development and deployment process,” she said.

“And platforms need to be doing much to detect, remove and prevent the spread of this extremely harmful content.”

Earlier this month, the eSafety Commission released a transparency report, revealing massive staff cuts at X Corp around the world.

According to the report, the global Trust and Safety staff was reduced by 30 per cent, while the Trust and Safety staff in the Asia Pacific region, including Australia, had a 45 per cent reduction.

Between November 2022 and May 2023, there were 6,103 previously banned accounts on Twitter that were reinstated on X.

At the time of the report’s release, eSafety commissioner Julie Inman Grant said Elon Musk’s staff cuts at X Corp. had created a “perfect storm” for the platform.

eSafety urges those concerned about the non-consensual sharing of images to report to eSafety at www.esafety.gov.au/Report.

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A seasoned business transformation specialist and CX pioneer, Gwynn has been at the forefront of the Australian tech startup scene for almost a decade following a successful international career as a corporate and government analyst and advisor.

“I really believe in TALK5’s mission,” said Gwynn. “We’re here to make safety universally comprehensible and accessible, irrespective of language or culture.”

Gwynn met TALK5’s founder George Bancs through a mutual friend in late 2022. Impressed by Gwynn’s track record in growing and scaling successful tech startups alongside some of Australia’s most impressive tech founders, Bancs invited her to join the organisation’s advisory board. 

In recent months she has taken on the role of CEO, and said she’s excited to work alongside George and our growing team to not only scale the business, but to lead the charge in AI-powered safety technology empowering a wide range of industries”.

In November 2023, TALK5 launched ‘Mina’ – the world’s first virtual safety, health coach and assistant, delivering voice-to-text and text-to-voice tools, in over 15 languages. This technology delivers essential safety instructions in each worker’s preferred language, eradicating potential misunderstandings caused by language differences. 

It’s a project close to Gwynn’s personal background as a migrant, having emigrated from Beijing to Sydney with her family as a teenager. She says going directly into an English-speaking high school was “a very scary process”, and she understands the impacts of cultural, linguistic and language barriers on learning and comprehension. 

Alongside Bancs, Gwynn’s vision is for TALK5 to redefine how language and safety intersect in the workplace. 

“What I love is the early-stage building part of an exciting young business, making an impact,” she says. 

Back in 2015, Gwynn was the first key go-to-market hire for global tech company SafetyCulture. 

“My years with Safety Culture gave me a really solid introduction to the work, health and safety space and instilled in me an obsession with safety and the importance of developing (and constantly evolving) an incredible product that delivers the best customer experience,” she said. 

 As their Global Head of Customer Success Gwynn achieved 40x MoM revenue growth and scaled the company from less than $1 million ARR to over $45 million, before joining recruitment disruptor Hatch in 2020. At Hatch, she led the industry-shaping development of their COVID-19 Labour Exchange, which placed thousands of workers in temporary employment in 2020.

Following Hatch, Gwynn joined Immutable, an NFT and blockchain technology platform, to lead all partnerships efforts. 

Now, as TALK5’s CEO, Gwynn is passionate about the software platform, saying it may ultimately “help save lives” as there’s “an increasingly diverse workforce, who are largely operating in high-risk sectors, with a sophisticated and efficient approach to work, health and safety training”. 

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Currently, it takes 42.2 days to place permanent roles in the Australian job market, according to recruitment software JobAdder. There is clearly plenty of opportunity in speeding up the process of connecting job seekers with those who are currently hiring.

Freelancing Gems, a job site championing women in the gig economy, say it has launched new functionality to support this. Their AI technology matches women to jobs as soon as they’re listed on the platform, reducing the delays in recruitment among current events impacting the job market such as the Great Resignation and the Great Re-Evaluation following the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.

CEO and co-founder Fleur Madden says, “Instead of waiting for applications to come in and 42 days to recruit, employers who use Freelancing Gems as one of their sources for connecting with talent will have an immediate response via our intelligent job matching model when a job ad is loaded.”

Madden adds that the new functionality also works to advocate for women who are hesitant to apply for positions, out of concern they don’t meet almost all of the criteria/

“By matching [women] on skills, experience, portfolios as well as values and cultural fit, it highlights roles they absolutely should be connecting with, but may not have otherwise thrown their hat in the ring,” she says.

In addition to creating a more holistic picture of a candidate for employers the site supports women looking for freelance, part-time, flexible, remote, contract and consulting roles in the gig economy– an element that has been at the core of the company’s ethos ever since it first launched at the start of Covid. 

When the pandemic hit, Madden says there were 1 million people out of work and that their job platform was able to place women in over 330 new roles alone last year. 

Their emphasis on the gig economy has allowed for the many women who take on caring roles and the majority of domestic responsibilities to have the flexible work options needed in order to participate in the workforce.

They’re anticipating that this new AI functionality will allow for even more impact by placing thousands more women into work during a time when employers are now seeking talent in droves but coming up against recruitment delays. 

“We know the future of work has changed. We know the 40-hour work week has been flipped on its head. We know the Great Resignation is here,” says Madden.

“When we launched Freelancing Gems, it was always our intention to use technology to be a gamechanger in the talent space and this is just the first piece of our AI roadmap that will enhance how we engage with users in the marketplace.”

This new matching model has been in the works for months, according to Madden who says that her co-founder Kirsty Jackson and Dr of AI, Dr Alan McCabe were at the helm of releasing it and are still collating data to job match. 

In time, freelancers on the site will also be given options to auto-match with business tools and resources suited to their industry and skill level.

Madden also adds that: “Offering pay advice on both sides of the marketplace is next to ensure that we are contributing to closing the gender pay gap for women in the gig economy, which is a key metric for us as a company.”

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N’Guessan won £25,000 (AUD $45,227) for her work building a system called BACE API. The technology uses Artificial Intelligence and facial recognition to verify the identities of African people remotely and in real time. Her company aims to change the way cyber security functions and reduce identity fraud, which is a prevalent issue in Africa and across the world. 

BACE API can be used with existing applications and systems for identity verification and is aimed at financial institutions in Africa.

The technology works by “matching the live photo of a user to the image on their documents such as passports or ID card,” N’Guessan told CNN. “For the person trying to submit their application, we ask them to switch on their camera to make sure the person behind the camera is real, and not a robot. We are able to capture the face of the person live and match their image with the one on the existing document the person submitted.”

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“ As a tech female founder, my contribution is to dymitify the tech industry, show that technology doesn’t have gender and create more opportunities for women.“, Charlette N’Guessan – Cofounder of BACE Group Happy international women’s day. #eachforequal #bacegroup #internationalwomensday @womeng #IWD2020

A post shared by BACE Group (@bacehq) on Mar 8, 2020 at 9:22am PDT

N’Guessan was awarded the Africa Prize for Innovation in a virtual award ceremony last Thursday. The Royal Academy of Engineering released a statement, noting the significance of technology like the one BACE provides for African communities specifically.

Rebecca Enonchong, a Cameroon entrepreneur and judge for this year’s prize, said in her statement, “It is essential to have technologies like facial recognition based on African communities, and we are confident their innovative technology will have far reaching benefits for the continent.”

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Did you know that the onboarding process is the most common customer experience breakpoint in banking? At @bacehq , we are committed to satisfying the identity verification requirements of Businesses. Our remote verification process ensures a reliable, simple, smooth and secure customer experience. Kindly learn more about our work here www.bacegroup.com #baceApI #Bacegroup #ID #identityverification #biometrics #security #onlinesafety #facialrecognition #banking #Ai #fintech #onlineservices #KyC #onboarding

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N’Guessan is the CEO and co-founder of the Ghana-based software company, BACE Group, which she started thinking about while she was an engineering student at the Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology in Ghana’s capital, Accra.

“We talked to tech entrepreneurs. That’s when we noticed that there is a huge problem with cyber security with online services and businesses,” she told CNN.  “We decided to make our contribution as software engineers and data scientists by building a solution that can be useful for this market.” 

The young technologist credits her father for encouraging her to pursue her passion and interests in science and technology from a young age.

“He inspired my choice for studying STEM. I was actually really good in science-related courses. After high school, I went on to study software engineering at university,” she said. “I will be happy if people are inspired by my story, being the first woman to win the Africa Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation and by my work as a woman in tech.” 

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