Tech is major focus as Melinda French Gates gives $150M to increase workplace equality for women

Melinda French Gates is giving $150 million to a variety of groups to help remove barriers for women in the workplace, including in the tech industry and the rapidly growing field of artificial intelligence.

The announcement Wednesday from French Gates’ Seattle-based Pivotal Ventures is part of the billionaire philanthropist’s prior commitment to grant $1 billion to programs and people working on women’s and family issues.

In a video on the Pivotal website, French Gates said that while women’s representation in the workforce has increased substantially over the last few years, significant barriers — such as lack of caregiving and ongoing discrimination — continue to hold women back from truly thriving at work.

“As it stands, the modern workplace simply wasn’t built with women in mind. And it’s time for that to change,” she said.

AI and tech innovation are a key focus of the change that French Gates believes is needed.

According to Axios, $45 million will go toward increasing women’s representation in AI and tech through groups such as the Center for Inclusive Computing, Rewriting the Code and Break Through Tech AI.

“AI will continue to have a growing and disproportionate impact on society, and we want to build the pipeline of women leaders shaping AI and ensure companies deploying AI are maximizing its benefits and minimizing its harms,” Dr. Renee Wittemyer, vice president of Program Strategy for Pivotal, said in an interview published on the website.

Wittemyer added that there are opportunities to leverage AI to remove workplace barriers for women as it is integrated into HR systems and other practices.

The Aspen Institute will get $75 million to establish a workplace innovation council, according to Axios, and other groups will share $30 million, including Lift Our Voices, Management Leadership for Tomorrow, National Partnership for Women & Families, Responsible Innovation Labs, and Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard Kennedy School.

Here’s the transcript of Gates’ video announcement on Wednesday:

“Women’s representation in the workforce has increased substantially over the last few years. However, there are significant barriers holding women back from truly thriving at work, a lack of caregiving, support, outdated and inflexible policies and practices and ongoing discrimination, harassment and even abuse. Unless we remove these barriers, we will never achieve true gender equality in this country, and we risk losing the precious progress we’ve already made.

“That’s why I’m committing $150 million to make the workplace more equal. I want to help create a workplace that actually works for everyone. Together with my team at Pivotal and our extraordinary partners, we will focus on building healthier workplaces for women, whether that’s helping employers offer better benefits or challenging outdated norms informing public policy, policy changes that secure essential protections for women from fair wages to paid leave and will be increasing representation in tech, especially AI, one of the most underrepresented and influential sectors today.

“As it stands, the modern workplace simply wasn’t built with women in mind. And it’s time for that to change.”