Toju Duke

With over 18 years experience spanning across Advertising, Retail, Not-For Profit and Tech, Toju is a popular speaker, author, thought leader and advisor on Responsible AI. Toju worked at Google for 10 years where she spent the last couple of years as a Programme Manager on Responsible AI leading various Responsible AI programmes across Google’s product and research teams with a primary focus on large-scale models and Responsible AI processes. Prior to her time  on Google’s research organisation, Toju was the EMEA product lead for Google Travel and worked as a specialist across Google Travel and Shopping.

Toju is also the founder of Diverse AI, a community interest organisation with a mission to support and champion underrepresented groups to build a diverse and inclusive AI future. Her passion to improve Artificial Intelligence and representation in the field, led to the birth of Diverse AI which is focused on 3 main activities: Education, Research and Events targeted at people who identify with underrepresented groups and either want to up skill, join the field or have a sense of belonging and community with like-minded people. Toju was previously the UK lead for “Women in AI”, a non-profit global organisation with a mission to drive gender diversity in AI.

Toju’s dedication and commitment to the development and deployment of Responsible AI practices led to the writing of her  book  “Building Responsible AI Algorithms”. The book introduces a Responsible AI framework and guides readers through processes to apply at each stage of the machine learning (ML) life cycle, from problem definition to deployment, in order to reduce and mitigate the risks and harms found in AI technologies. The book provides practical tips and guidance on how to develop models that are fair, transparent, safe, secure, robust, and ethical.

Toju believes in the great benefits AI has on society,  and also understands the perils and harms it could pose to many, particularly those from underrepresented communities.  It’s her passion to spread awareness of the amazing benefits of AI, as well as the harms and risks associated with it, and potential ways to mitigate these harms associated with AI technologies.