With a degree in biomedical science and investment banking experience at Goldman Sachs, Claire Myers-Lamptey has a plethora of skills beneath her belt. Now, as the tech founder of BioWired AI, she's on this podcast to share how her diverse background sparked the innovation behind a wellness and healthcare app that has huge potential in delivering inclusion in the workplace.
Claire takes us through the groundbreaking features designed to support those with disabilities, ensuring no one is left behind in our increasingly remote world. If you're drawn to the places where humanity meets technology, Claire's vision paints a future brimming with promise.
If you want to build a more inclusive workplace that you can be proud of please visit our website to learn more.
With a degree in biomedical science and investment banking experience at Goldman Sachs, Claire Myers-Lamptey has a plethora of skills beneath her belt. Now, as the tech founder of BioWired AI, she's on this podcast to share how her diverse background sparked the innovation behind a wellness and healthcare app that has huge potential in delivering inclusion in the workplace.
Claire takes us through the groundbreaking features designed to support those with disabilities, ensuring no one is left behind in our increasingly remote world. If you're drawn to the places where humanity meets technology, Claire's vision paints a future brimming with promise.
If you want to build a more inclusive workplace that you can be proud of please visit our website to learn more.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Inclusive Growth Show with Toby Mildon. Future-proofing your business by creating a diverse workplace.
Toby Mildon: Hey there. Thank you ever so much for tuning into this episode of the Inclusive Growth Podcast. I am Toby Mildon, and today I'm joined by Claire Myers-Lamptey. And I'm really excited to be sitting down with Claire because Claire has started a tech startup called Bio-Wired AI. And before I got into diversity and inclusion myself, I worked in technology. So I was an IT consultant for Accenture. I worked in healthcare technology and Claire's technology is within the well-being and healthcare space. And then I ended up as a project manager for the BBC, working on the news website and the BBC Sounds app and accessibility features. So I'm a bit of a geek at heart. So I'm really looking forward to sitting down with Claire to explore the technology that she's developed that we can use within the diversity and inclusion space, but it's also something I mentioned in my first book around the role that technology plays in diversity and inclusion.
Toby Mildon: So, technology can help us implement diversity and inclusion in so many different ways. We're seeing lots coming online nowadays, and technology can help us really amplify what we're doing within the EDI space. So it's really great to be sitting down with Claire and just getting to learn more about the technology that she's developing. So Claire, it's lovely to see you. Thanks for joining us.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Hi, Toby. Thanks so much for inviting me. I'm really looking forward to this discussion.
Toby Mildon: You're very welcome. That was obviously a bit of a brief introduction. Could you just introduce yourself in your own words? Let us know about who you are, what you do and your background and your professional accreditations, that kind of thing.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. So my name is Claire Myers-Lamptey. As you said, I'm tech founder of Bio-Wired AI app. I am Black. I am female. I am married. I am mother. And you also alluded to the fact that I've been in IT. I've had quite a varied career, which I think has all contributed to get me to this position that I'm at now. And I enjoyed hearing your diverse background as well.
Toby Mildon: Brilliant. So how did you transfer from working in biomedical sciences to technology and to HR? That's three very distinct industries that you've worked in.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: It is. So my first degree was in biomedical sciences. Then I ended up in investment banking at Goldman Sachs. And one of the good things about that organisation was that it was very large, had lots of different departments. And so if you were willing to put yourself forward and acquire the skills needed for that role to demonstrate you had the ability, then it was possible to change career directions. So I went from investment research to IT and then to HR. And yes, in IT I was definitely sort of coding and project managing. And then in HR, I was focused on diversity.
Toby Mildon: That's really cool. It's almost similar. I mean, I didn't... I'm not a sciency type person, so I've been nowhere near biomedical sciences, but like you, I worked in IT as a project manager and but I was more interested in the human interface and the human psychology of using tech. So I tended to work in sort of user experience roles and that kind of thing. And then, yeah, then I moved into HR myself. So that's really interesting. So what was the inspiration behind developing Bio-Wired AI?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. So part of my evolving career, just most recently, previously, I actually opened a spa. It was a project where I refurbished a derelict former 1790 bank. It was Gurney's Bank. Gurney's became Barclays. And I opened up a spa. I designed it myself. So it changed from a design project into one where I was actively involved in supporting people in their wellness. So on that journey, I became aware of lots of different sort of therapies, treatments, got involved with lots of different types of professionals in order to cater for the clients that visited the facility. And so that is where wellness, technology, human resources, my biomedical sciences background all came together to put me on this journey to create this app.
Toby Mildon: I just love how all of those different strands intersected at that point in your life, and what's manifesting from that is a new piece of really cool and interesting technology that we'll explore now. So could you just explain to us how the Bio-Wired app works and what its key features are.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. So using your mobile phone and a wearable device, the Bio-Wired AI app monitors your state of well-being. So that's your mental, emotional, and physical. And you also control via the app something that we call the e-Dome, called the employee dome. And there you can prioritise chapters of your life. So we look at well-being as six chapters; health, financial, relationship, for example, environmental, lifestyle. So you can also negate things that would normally be recorded as a bias against you. So you create your perfect world. We use the biometric readings and we come up with an optimal well-being score. When you fall outside of that score, at the first instance, your AI well-being coach will come on board and say, I've noticed you're a bit stressed, for example. And then we'll suggest things that you can do from resources that we have to sort of reduce your stress levels. If there are readings that are concerning, the AI Wellness Coach will accelerate it to the EAP program that we also bring on board with the app, where you'll then have human contact with professionals who may be GPs, therapists or coaches who will then try to put a program together to get you back to optimal wellness.
Toby Mildon: That sounds really cool.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: And additionally, a feature we have is daily well-being coaches who come on board just to motivate you. Speaking with my professionals, whether it's about financial well-being or health well-being, 30% is only what the professional can give you in terms of advice or even medication. And they all agree that 70% is dependent on our decision to change the situation that we're in. And so using that theory, we will have daily well-being coaches whose jobs are just to motivate people.
Toby Mildon: Yeah. That's really cool. Probably something I could do with. So you mentioned that you wear a wearable and then you've... That's also connected to your own device. So how does it actually measure well-being and what kind of data is it collecting?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. So in addition to sort of basic physiological data like heart rate, et cetera, we use another sort of scientific concept, I would say, which also takes readings of your brain, your physiological responses in your body, and these readings are... We derive the readings from loads of charts, from studies of lots of people, thousands and thousands of people. And so what it means is that there are optimal levels for every single organ of your body, even emotions that have been recorded over several years. And so when you fall outside of that taking into account the biases or the conditions that you have disclosed to the app, that is how we get your optimal well-being range. And not to sound wooly, but we don't want to reveal the actual DNA of how we do it all.
Toby Mildon: Yeah. Well, it's your secret sauce. It's like the KFC recipe, isn't it? You know, no one's gonna give away the KFC recipe. You mentioned a couple of times the biases and how we have to take those into consideration so that you've got your optimal employee dome or your own personalised score in a way. What kind of biases are we talking about?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. That's a great question. So we firmly believe that in life, we don't journey on a sort of a straight unchallenged line where everything is perfect. Life is a sort of a wavy thing. And so if we look at those six chapters, at any time, there will be things affecting us that act as a bias. Because what normally happens in organisations is when they're working out KPIs, they are normally modeled on White, male, young human. And where we fall short of that is a bias because we are measured against this ideal candidate, if you like. So what the app allows us to do is to be measured against our own strengths and weaknesses. Another element that excites me about the app is that we can use your optimal well-being score in a logarithm with KPIs from the organisation to come up with workflow productivity. And that in theory should alter depending also on your well-being score. So quite rightly, if your well-being score is low and you need support to get back to optimal, we feel then that your expectations for workflow productivity should also be adjusted in line.
Toby Mildon: So there's all sorts of different apps and devices out there already. So for example, I've already used the Oura Ring, which I found quite helpful to monitor my well-being. But how does the Bio-Wired app differ from some of the other devices that are already available?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. So in the first version, our wearable device, if you like, is just the size of a key ring and it requires contact with the body and you don't have to wear it all the time. We are just relying on weekly readings. Secondly, it's real time and the changes are measured against your optimal well-being reading. And from what I can gather, a lot of these other devices, they're not taking into account changes in your world or your ecosystem if you like. It's not a two channel reading. We have a two channel reading where the app is always taking data from your e-Dome, if you like, your ecosystem, together with what is happening in the world. When I say your ecosystem, it's what's created on your app representing your digital world. So it's bringing together your digital world with your physical world and using both of those data to support your well-being.
Toby Mildon: That's really cool. And I think one thing that's worth exploring maybe here is how the devices cater for different diverse groups as well. So for example, I'm a wheelchair user and I mentioned already that I've used the Oura Ring and these devices don't quite work well for everybody. So for example, I think my Oura Ring is giving me false readings about steps. I don't walk at all, I'm permanently using a wheelchair, yet at the end of the day it tells me that I've like done two and a half thousand steps. And I'm like, how on earth did I accomplish that? And then I'm thinking, well, is it giving me an accurate reading of how many calories I've burned in that day? Because I do have a very sedentary lifestyle because I don't walk, I'm sat in a wheelchair all day, or I'm at bed at night. So how does your app cater for different diverse groups, especially those with disabilities, which I'm particularly interested in hearing about?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Great question. I mean, the exciting thing is that we live in an app world. So for instance, if you use a hearing aid, we can connect that data to the app. So Bio-Wired AI would know that this is a person who has hearing limitations in the same way with your state of the art wheelchair, I hope there is some sort of app or something that we could also connect to. So it won't be measuring footsteps, it would be measuring something else. What we decide to measure is based on the communication between the two devices. So I can't say offhand what we'd use to measure in your situation, but there are lots of things that we can decide to measure to record your movement together with your physiological data.
Toby Mildon: That's really interesting. 'Cause so for example, if I am taking a car journey and I've got a wheelchair accessible vehicle, so I drive my wheelchair into the car, I imagine that actually I probably use up a lot of energy in the car because I'm having... My muscles are having to work against the movement of the car, rocking side and side and breaking and accelerating and stuff like that. So it'd be really interesting to compare the data of me in the car versus me just sat at my desk recording a podcast like we are now. That would be really cool.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Absolutely. And the more I talk about the app, the same thing that's just happened happens. There are more questions that are raised and that is exciting because it is going to be an open platform that you can plug in different things and use the data how you want to use it. Which brings me onto the point of privacy. This is being marketed as a HR tool. Your data does not go to your employer. What happens is all your personal data stays on your phone. Any information that we are using in order to monitor you is sort of encrypted in the cloud. And all the company gets, or the HR platform gets is indicative data, which we feel is also the exciting thing about this app. So your employer gets a snapshot of their organisation so they can see that look, 15% of the workforce are stressed, 10% are suffering from mobility issues that we are not meeting.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: You know, 5% of the women are going through menopause. There's 10% going through bereavement, that type of thing. And so all decisions they make in terms of supporting their employees with well-being are batched matched and tailored and not guesswork. I use for example, sound baths or menopause clinics. I think there was a time and perhaps still is where reaction to well-being is sort of reactionary. It's without any sort of science or measurement.
Toby Mildon: Yeah.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Because how many menopause clinics do you really need in an organisation? Is it proportional to the needs of your people. And sound baths, are you tracking how that is improving? Because there are so many things. And I think the term well-being, it's used very general, but as we try to demonstrate in having these six chapters, it encompasses a lot of things because we are complicated beings. And what further excites me is that with this tool, companies can now start to monitor the well-being of their remote workers and work from home. Because I believe that a lot of them are quite challenged, when it comes to supporting that outside of the.
Toby Mildon: Yeah. And also the data around people working from home might well support their policies around whether or not they mandate everybody to go back to work. Because if, for example, the policy is everybody has to be in the office four days a week and then they're allowed to work from home one day a week, but then that increases everybody's stress levels and reduces their well-being score, then that's probably not a great policy for employee productivity.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. And I love that you've raised this question because what is key in the media at the moment are return to office mandates. What we are seeing is a bit of a seismic shift, and it's fueled by a lot of different things. You've got AI technologies that are set to transform the workplace in terms of increasing productivity and offering so many other things. You also have got the issue of real estate. So companies have got these amazing offices that no one is using, and then you've got the issue of well-being. And I see it being played out as a fight for equity. And so I think work from home is a very interesting part of this negotiation where employees want more equity within an organisation. But I also feel it's part of a bigger discussion that we shouldn't overlook, which is about AI technologies and upskilling your employees for a future economy.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: We also live in a country where the population is changing. There are far more older people than younger people. The World Economic Forum has predicted that by, I believe it's 2060, 80% of the workforce will come from Asia, Africa, South America. So these are all challenges for companies of today and companies of today should be looking at solutions. We should be talking about sustainable careers. And you are quite right. The good thing about this app is that it gives a way of measuring workflow productivity. And people that I've told about the app are very interested to see measurements. They'd like to compare how somebody works in the office as opposed to their home. And also I've started to work with other interesting startups, and one of them is called Coremoting. And that's a very interesting theory as well or project whereby it encourages workers to work together from their homes. So that startup is very interested in comparing measurements of workflow productivity in the office, in your home, on your own, or co-working in your home. So the idea of this startup, Coremoting, is that you can open your home to another colleague so you can work together. The reason this has come about is ironically, in fighting for work from home, employees have also reported a state of loneliness.
Toby Mildon: Yeah.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Research is showing that people are quite happy with sort of three days at home, but there'll be two days where they'd like to change their environment, and sort of coffee shops are not always the best places to work in for different reasons. Libraries are being shut. And there is also sometimes a bit of a sterile environment in some sort of co-working spaces. So this is a social exercise because it suggests that you can choose to work with someone based on gender or similar disability, or even as mothers, you could be two single mothers and by working together it could also solve childcare issues.
Toby Mildon: Yeah. It's really cool. There's so many solutions here, and I really like the whole equitable piece. 'Cause as you were sort of describing that, I was thinking when I've worked for companies, you know, I've just been offered the bog-standard well-being packages like gym membership for example, which is absolutely no use to me whatsoever. Because I just don't have the physical strength to... I can't even lift up a pencil, let alone go to a gym lifting weight. So I suppose using technology like Bio-Wired AI gives businesses very specific data so that they can take the targeted action where it's needed. And this is a general philosophy that I share with my clients anyway, because they get very excited putting their diversity and inclusion strategy together and they come up with great solutions. And I have to say, hang on a minute, just wait a minute because do you know if these solutions that you're proposing are actually getting to the root cause of the issues in your organisation? Is creating a career development program for women because you're worried about the lack of women at the senior leadership position, is that program actually going to solve the problem? Or is there something much more fundamental and underlying that we need to address? And that's where the power of data comes in. So we need to have that data, we need to have those insights to really understand what's really going on for people in an organisation.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Absolutely. And there is where I get excited about AI technologies because it allows us to map somebody's being, if you like. And so we can track what is really going on with an individual when they're faced with these issues in the workplace and in life in general. And I think it helps us to get to true inclusivity because I would like to get to a point whereby, and I think we will get there anyway, because if you think about it, if we are getting to a stage where we are not gonna have enough workers who are... And we are having a skill shortage, whatever, the whole way we think about employment has to change. And for me, the ideal is using technology to work out what is a person's strength and weaknesses and creating a job role around that. And that shouldn't be impossible. And even take into account the times of the day that the person is most productive. And so it could also banish 9:00 to 5:00.
Toby Mildon: Yeah. Which is an Industrial Revolution invention, wasn't it? It was that the eight hour working day was all about productivity in a factory when we were just churning out widgets. It's really not fit for the modern age where we're working in information and technology and yeah, a different world.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Definitely. And you touched on compensation, and that's very interesting because I also raised a scenario with the Bio-Wired app to say, for instance, you could have two individuals and the app could show that one person actually completes all their targets or their job role in sort of three days. So what do you do with that person? How do you reward that person fairly? Now, that could be a case that that person then only works a three-day week because... And they have two days off. Or it could be that, what, do you compensate them with salary or do you compensate them with other benefits? There are very interesting benefits coming into play such as interest-free loans and also even using Bitcoin because it is also possible to replicate your company and to give shares in another dimension that people can exchange for different things. Now, I find that really fascinating.
Toby Mildon: This is really exciting. This is so Space Age, isn't it? It's like we might as well be on the Starship Enterprise is the... You know, it's really exciting.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: It is exciting. On the one hand, I can see how people want to slow down and think, hang on a minute, this is just a bit too fast. But for me, it excites me because it really does level the playing field. Really does address equality, equity, inclusivity, diversity, everything, which is what we've all been striving to do. And suddenly we have the tools and the language and the tech to do this. And I urge companies to really think out of the box because I'm hearing the same conversations and that's why I'm so excited to speak with you because I go to conferences or I listen to webinars and people are saying the same thing.
Toby Mildon: Yeah. It's just the same old stuff that's just being recycled. And I think particularly within the diversity and inclusion space, there is a lot of frustration that the needle hasn't shifted much over the last couple of decades. I talk to colleagues who've been working in EDI like me for longer than I have, and they're frustrated. They're saying, I'm just repeating the same old thing. I'm saying the same thing today that I said 20, 30 years ago about a quality within the workplace and things are just not shifting. But I think we are in this interesting time where I do think that the introduction of new technologies is really gonna help us. And also just the shift that we've seen from us getting through the pandemic and how people's attitudes and relationships to work has changed as well. So I think it's kind of a culmination of all these things are really gonna shift things. What's the current status of the app and when are you hoping to launch it?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. We're hoping to launch it in six months. Now, when it comes to the EAP, that will be ready in four to six weeks that companies can sign up to. And also our research element, because in speaking to companies, it's become apparent that there is an element of guidance that needs to be given in order to prepare for this amazing app that's gonna come on board soon. So there are questions that organisations need to ask and get in place before adoption of the app if they're going to get the best out of it in our opinion. So we are also offering consultation from the beginning of March, which is gonna be very interesting and very exciting. [laughter]
Toby Mildon: That's cool. I mean, the app is already game changing. How do you think this is gonna evolve in the future?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: So we would like to map the employee e-Dome to the organisation ecosystem. And as you were speaking, I was thinking about disability and access. I mean, it's so exciting that you can use AI technologies now to improve the workplace as a physical place for people to come and work in very quickly and very easily, which is exciting and at a relatively low cost to what has happened historically.
Toby Mildon: Could you give me an example of how AI could be used for that?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. So we've been talking about all types of wearable devices. So for instance, what's really exciting is if you're in an organisation that uses sort of multiple office locations, if you like, it could even be global, and let's say that you have a scenario where somebody's blind, we can get to a situation where you can map your company ecosystem in terms of your location, floor plans and everything, match it to your employee's e-Dome, and through the wearable device and their phone, they can quite confidently navigate themselves to any of your locations without any limitations, even if they're blind. And no reason why they can't do that.
Toby Mildon: That's really cool. Yeah. So the penultimate question that I ask everyone is then, what does inclusive growth mean to you?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Yes. And sorry, we didn't even touch onto Neurodiverse. So it also supports Neurodiverse in similar ways because again, it will tap into the strengths of the individual and map them to specific roles within an organisation. So in summary, yes, for me, inclusion, I now think we have never been more closer to realizing inclusion. And that's because of technology and the change of the world. And I don't believe that there is now an excuse, and we need to rely on data because we live in a data-driven world. And so if anyone says they're inclusive, I want to see the data.
Toby Mildon: Yeah. Yeah. [laughter] Absolutely. Yeah. That's something I'm working on as well with the university about how can we collect inclusivity data and present it back to the organisation in real time. So, you know, you could have a head of HR log on and see whether the score is going up or down.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Absolutely. It's no longer a word that can be thrown around. We should be talking about inclusive data.
Toby Mildon: Absolutely.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: That would soon tell us how inclusive an organisation is.
Toby Mildon: Yeah. Definitely. Thanks ever so much for joining me today. Before you go, if the person listening to us right now wants to learn more about the Bio-Wired AI technology, what should they do?
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Please get in contact. I'd love to talk with you at any stage that you are at. This is a really exciting time for us because by speaking to people, it's really helping us to, to develop the product and to engage with business. You can google Bio-Wired app, Bio-Wired AI, and I will come up, find me on LinkedIn and send me a message, invite me to connect and I'd love that.
Toby Mildon: Brilliant. Well, Claire, thanks ever so much for joining me today. It's been lovely to have a chat with you and I'm really excited to see how your technology develops and hopefully we'll start to see it being actively used in businesses to help improve the well-being of people working in organisations. That would be amazing.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Thank you so much, Toby. It's been great fun and I am so excited that I've got the thumbs up from you.
[laughter]
Toby Mildon: Well, I'll be one of your first customers, so put me on your list for when the devices are ready.
Claire Myers-Lamptey: Most definitely.
Toby Mildon: All right. And thank you for tuning into this episode of the Inclusive Growth podcast with myself and Claire. Hopefully you found it really interesting and hopefully it's got your kind of brain wiring as to how technology like Bio-Wired AI could actually be used to benefit the well-being and productivity of people working in your organisation. So if you are interested in learning more about the technology and how it could help your organisation, please do google Bio-Wired AI as Claire suggested, and/or you can connect with Claire Myers-Lamptey on LinkedIn and she will continue the conversation with you over there. Until next time, I look forward to seeing you on the next episode of this podcast, which will be coming up very soon. Take care.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to the Inclusive Growth Show. For further information and resources from Toby and his team, head on over to our website at mildon.co.uk.