Tracey Spicer AM: AI integrity, bias by design, and the leadership responsibility we can't afford to ignore

In this episode of The Wisdom Of … Show, host Simon Bowen speaks with Tracey Spicer AM - journalist, broadcaster, author, and one of Australia's clearest voices on the intersection of technology, equity, and the future of responsible business. A multiple Walkley Award winner, Order of Australia recipient, Sydney Peace Prize recipient alongside Tarana Burke, and author of Man Made (winner, Australian Business Book Awards Social Responsibility category), Tracey has spent three decades in Australia's public life, and the last several years investigating the most significant design flaw in our emerging technological future … the bias being quietly written into the systems that will shape it.

Simon builds a live visual model in the episode, the AI Integrity Model, mapping the three-part framework for moving AI systems from bias to equity across data sets, algorithms, and machine learning.

Episode breakdown

00:00 Welcome to The Wisdom Of … Show and introduction of Tracey Spicer AM

03:00 Growing up on the outskirts of Brisbane: what social justice looks like as a lived value

08:30 "Give it a go. What's the worst that could happen?" The philosophy behind a 30-year career

11:45 The Lady Stripped Bare: the TEDx talk, 7 million views, the trolling, and what it actually meant

17:00 MeToo in Australia: listening as leadership, and how to open a conversation in a room that doesn't want to have it

22:00 The price of bias: widening inequality, the talent excluded from pipelines, and the cost of machine bias

26:00 Man Made: how an 11-year-old asking for a robot slave launched a forensic investigation into bias by design

32:00 The difference between performative and effective: what organisations doing AI governance well actually do differently

34:00 LIVE MODEL BUILD: The AI Integrity Model

44:00 Data sets, from bias to equity: clean, intentional, curated

47:00 Algorithms, from bias to equity: designer diversity, bias consciousness, continuous testing

50:00 Machine learning: human in the loop, agentic AI, and why the Amazon hiring tool story matters 55:00 What does the world look like in 14 years if we do this right? A toast to future generations

58:00 Personal philosophy: the leadership power of pause

About Tracey Spicer AM

Tracey Spicer AM is a multiple Walkley Award-winning journalist, broadcaster, author, and advocate with 30 years across Australia's major media networks, including the ABC, Network 10, and Sky News. She is the inaugural national convenor of Women in Media Australia, a Sydney Peace Prize recipient alongside Tarana Burke for her leadership of the MeToo movement in Australia, and an Order of Australia recipient.

Her book Man Made, a rigorously researched investigation into how historical bias is being embedded into AI and technology systems, won the Social Responsibility category at the Australian Business Book Awards. Her TEDx talk, "The Lady Stripped Bare," has 7 million views globally.

Connect with Tracey Spicer AM:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/traceyspicer/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/TraceySpicer/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/traceyspicerjournalist/

Website: https://traceyspicer.com.au/

About Simon Bowen

Simon has spent over two decades working with influential leaders across complex industries. His focus is on elevating thinking in organisations, recognising that success is directly proportional to the quality of thinking and ideas within a business. Simon leads the renaissance of thinking through his work with global leaders and organisations.

Connect with Simon

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/simonbowen-mm/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/officialsimonbowen/

Website: https://thesimonbowen.com/

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