What’s a ‘Tech Humanist’? – Kate O’Neill, CEO of KO Insights at Smart City Expo World Congress 2025

“One of the other important things about tech humanism to me is that the three-way relationship between business humans and tech is primarily about the relationship between business objectives and human outcomes and using technological capability to amplify that alignment, as opposed to using technology to amplify only the business objective side of that relationship. So really trying to think about how does a business meet the humans that it serves, and then how can technology be part of making that more effective and more successful so the business can succeed and the humans can have a better experience on the other side of that success.”

Kate O’Neill on Electric Ladies Podcast

 Technology has infiltrated every aspect of our lives, yet do we really understand its relationship with humans? Everybody’s talking about and wrestling with understanding artificial intelligence – AI – in their business, governments and lives, but not everyone understands the intersection between technology and the human experience. How can we maximize it?

Listen to self-described “tech humanist” Kate O’Neill, CEO of KO Insights and an advisor on these issues, including to the United Nations AI Advisory Board, in this fascinating conversation with Electric Ladies Podcast host Joan Michelson at the 2025 Smart City Expo World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.

You’ll hear about:

●        Why humans are at the core of everything: “You're never more than a degree away from people downstream of the decisions that you're making.”

●        Questions matter: What are the questions boards and leaders should be asking instead of just collecting data and making decisions as if humans are not affected?

●        How can we leverage AI to address climate change? It’s about a range of factors, both impact of the technology itself and how it can be leveraged to help humans.

●        Plus, insightful career advice:

 

“It's anybody's guess, on some level, what the next set of jobs that AI implementations will displace are going to be. But what I think we can feel fairly confident about for the time being is that soft skills, the soft skills that we've all been told are those we need to cultivate. Like context intelligence, emotional intelligence, good judgment, communication, those kinds of things are incredibly important no matter what. And the great thing about this for the question that you ask, is that women have been socialized to be stronger in those skills in general. So we already have an advantage when it comes to that.” Kate O’Neill on Electric Ladies Podcast

Read Joan’s Forbes articles here.

You’ll also like:

·       Urban Climate Actions at the 2025 Smart City Expo World Congress: Listen to Joan’s panel with three extraordinary urban women leaders from across the globe who are using creative strategies to address climate issues.

·       “Technology is Not Neutral”: with Stephanie Hare, Ph.D., author of “Technology is Not Neutral,” Researcher and BBC Broadcaster

·       Leveraging A.I. For Sustainability: with Mandi McReynolds, Chief Sustainability Officer at Workiva, software infrastructure company

·       Using Climate Modelling – with Maria Caffrey, Ph.D., UK National Physical Laboratory, on how climate modelling works and how best to use it most effectively 

·       Predicting Climate Impacts In Neighborhoods – with Jessica Filante Farrington, AT&T’s Director of Global Sustainability

 

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