Could AI-led research help us create more inclusive products?

In tech, we have this saying: “You are not the user.” Yet technology products and experiences are still crafted by a narrow sliver of society. Tech teams have done little to escape their bubbles, regrettably leading to deep bias in decision-making and, ultimately, the systems we’ve created. Even worse, all our inherent biases are being folded into AI technology, exacerbating the exclusionary nature of the tech we’re building.

Genway's Interactive Human AI Interface - backed by 1st Party Research

My grandmother has never learned to use Google Maps, she couldn’t be bothered. But she hasn’t tried to use any other kind of map either… So whenever she gets lost around town and needs help getting home, she calls her daughters or worse, the police. Whenever I hear my mom receive the inevitable call from the police, I reflect on why we haven’t done more to help everyone successfully navigate technology products (and their way back home…)

In tech, we have this saying: “You are not the user.” Yet technology products and experiences are still crafted by a narrow sliver of society. Tech teams have done little to escape their bubbles, regrettably leading to deep bias in decision-making and, ultimately, the systems we’ve created. Even worse, all our inherent biases are being folded into AI technology, exacerbating the exclusionary nature of the tech we’re building. 

It’s not all bad news, though. There’s a path toward inclusive design, which, as the Inclusive Design Research Centre defines it, is: “a design process that considers the full range of human diversity with respect to ability, language, culture, gender, age, and other forms of human difference.” (source) Search for “how to design inclusive products,” and you’ll get two buckets of answers:

1. Build a more diverse team. 

2. Connect with, research, and include the voices of more diverse user/customer populations.

We are not building Genway to help companies build more diverse teams, but we are dedicated to helping your (hopefully diverse teams) research anyone, gleaning thick, rich data at a practically infinite scale. 

Studying broader, more diverse audiences means gaining better insight into how people of different abilities will use your products. Such a research practice could lead you to understand why children aren’t able to save their favorite videos on your media app, or why adults can’t seem to discover their banking benefits within your up-and-coming fintech startup. Studying diverse audiences could be the difference between my grandmother navigating her way home or phoning 911 for the 13th time this year. 

Tech companies have traditionally had to make tough choices regarding who to research. With limited resources, they may choose to focus on “key segments” or “priority audiences,” which often represent a highly constrained slice of the population compared to the full spectrum of who’d actually benefit from their products.

Genway’s end-to-end rapid user interviewing solution leverages the latest AI technology to conduct user research autonomously, augmenting research by Insight Generating Functions with actionable insights on broad, diverse populations in real-time

At Genway, we aim to resolve this issue entirely by unlocking human insights at the scale and speed that only AI can afford us. Genway’s end-to-end rapid user interviewing solution leverages the latest AI technology to conduct user research autonomously, augmenting research by Insight Generating Functions with actionable insights on broad, diverse populations in real-time. We offer a solution that benefits businesses building inclusive products and everyone they wish to serve. 

If you’d like to learn more about what we’re up to at Genway, check out our website at www.genway.ai. We’re working hard to leverage AI in ways that benefit our society and help us build technology inclusively. 

We’re perfecting the end-to-end process of conducting interviews by leveraging AI to refine and enhance how research teams schedule research, synthesize their learnings, and integrate them into their workflows for maximal impact on everyone, for everyone. 

We’re always looking for feedback; If you’d like to try Genway, reach out at natan@genway.ai or DM me on LinkedIn.