AI for Climate Impact: The CTO’s Playbook for Building with Purpose

Most climate solutions are slowed down not by a lack of innovation, but by the difficulty in scaling impactful technology fast enough. Georgie Steele, CTO and climate tech pioneer, reveals her playbook for harnessing AI to accelerate climate action — building systems that combine speed, precision, and purpose. If you’re a leader committed to making a real difference, this episode is your blueprint for turning complex policy data into tangible impact, while fostering diverse, empowered teams that drive meaningful change.

You’ll discover how Georgie’s team rapidly developed their MVP—breaking down multi-layered policy questions into small, scalable steps that deliver immediate value. She shares innovative ways AI is transforming climate policy analysis, from processing over 500,000 documents with semantic similarity models to generating decision-grade insights that slash manual effort and supercharge speed. Georgie also dives into how building with purpose shifts product strategy, blending AI with expert collaboration to deliver credible, actionable results at a global scale.

Get insights into building teams that are as diverse as the challenges we face, and leaders who support natural contributions from quiet voices. Learn the leadership playbook—creating psychological safety, enabling flexible work, and supporting authentic selves—so innovation flows freely. Georgie emphasizes that technological impact hinges on inclusive environments where different perspectives spark breakthrough solutions.

This episode is perfect for tech leaders ready to pivot their careers toward purpose-driven climate innovation or companies eager to leverage AI in creating scalable, measurable climate impact. If you believe that the right technology is driven by diverse teams innovating with purpose, you’ll find this conversation both inspiring and actionable. Step into the future of climate tech—faster, smarter, and more inclusive.

To follow Georgie’s ground-breaking work, visit the links in our show notes. For leaders committed to building a purpose-led tech strategy, explore our frameworks at Anaiya Group at anaya.org. Keep leading intentionally—our planet needs your impact now more than ever.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

When thinking about it, like what really drives change in society, unfortunately, like I'd love it that people just want to change things and want to do things better, but really like there's a forcing function that needs to be had, and that's done through policy. So there are all of these climate policies out there, and what we saw that um lots of companies know that there are policies that are impacting them, but they don't really know how to react. They don't know which of those policies because there's so many in the system. So we really felt like we could help companies understand which policies apply to them and how to react, and therefore help companies implement the intention behind policies rather than just paying fines. Because that means that the money that companies are then spending actually goes towards like the solution behind this problem.

SPEAKER_00 1:20

But how do you lead a team when your goal isn't just profit, but planetary survival? Welcome to the Anaya Algorithm, the podcast for leaders who want to build the future intentionally. I'm your host, Magdalene Amagashti, the CEO for Anaya Group. Today, we're joined by a leader who is on the forefront of this challenge. Georgie Steele, a CTO in the climate tech space who is building technology with purpose. In this episode, Georgie shares her playbook for using AI to accelerate climate solutions, building efficient systems that empower diverse teams, improving impact at speed. This is a masterclass in how to fuse the deep technical expertise with the world-changing mission. Please join me in welcoming Georgie Steele. Thanks so much, Magda. Pleasure to be here. Georgie, as a CTO, a leader in the climate space, and a champion for diverse teams, you sit at the intersection of so many critical conversations. Thank you for being here. Welcome to the NA algorithm. Would you mind introducing yourself first, please?

SPEAKER_01 2:32

Of course. So as you said, I'm CTO and co-founder of Maven, where we turn macro shifts into actionable insights. So think of things like policy changes, trade, and geopolitics. We help companies understand what is relevant to them, how it impacts their business, and what actions that they can take. So we built and shipped our MVP in two months. We raised 1.5 million pre-seed round in two weeks. And now we're working with customers across the globe. My background, I was a full stack engineer and then went into engineering management before I started founding. So I worked at Tractable, where I helped them become a unicorn. We were working with a lot of AI products. And then I worked at Silvera, which is more of a climate tech company, and I helped scale their back-end systems by 10x. And prior to all of this, I worked in Formula One at McLaren as a structural design engineer, where I was the only woman on my team. Magda has encouraged me to say my awards, so I also am recognized in Ford's 30 under 30 in the technology category. I was an IET scholar, so recognized as one of the most promising engineers in the UK. And on top of all of that, I also have helped mentor over a hundred that over a hundred um engineers through the mentorship schemes that I have set up. And I'm a UN Woman UK delegate. Today I'm really excited to get into topics like Orkbide productivity, building with AI, and diversity by design. Can't wait for this conversation.

SPEAKER_00 4:10

Wow, Joseph, thank you. I love your intro about yourself. Your impressive, you've got such an impressive career, and really kudos to you for the great work you've done so far. You've built a career leading technology teams, but you've chosen to focus your immense talent on one of the biggest challenges of our time, climate change. What drives you to apply your skills as a CTO to the climate crisis specifically?

SPEAKER_01 4:38

I think so. I've always wanted to have an impact. Um, and as a kid, I was, well, at school, I was really focused on climate. So I was obsessed with this book called Um Sustainable Energy Without the Hot Air, um, which is a little bit out of date now, but it's a very good book, and I would encourage people to read it. And it essentially goes through how we can power the UK through renewable energies. Um, so that was a lot of the reason why I went and studied what I call traditional engineering. So I studied everything except for software engineering.

SPEAKER_00 5:13

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 5:14

Um and then I think, like a lot of people, when they study it, they kind of become a little bit disillusioned because there's a lot of um like texts from the 70s, for instance, that are kind of still saying what we're trying to say now. Um, so it felt like there was a lot of change to be made, but no one was really listening to it when I was studying. So instead I went and focused on how can I apply my skills to advanced technologies and helping and hope, hoping that some of the advances we would make would trickle down into society. I think I was a bit naive to think that I could do that in Formula One. Uh, the advances, like, although great, they really don't impact society um globally. Um, so then when I moved into software, I was looking for companies where I could have uh much bigger impact. Um and I think working at Silvera really helped reignite that passion for climate tech and helped me realize how much we can really impact things. And there's such a large community really trying to help push things forward and help make help make sure that we do have a planet that we like in the future. Um and I think software and technology has such a huge role to play in to uh to play in this. Um so when Larson and I were thinking about what sort of uh product we want to build um at Maven, we really focused on the climate tech space because both of us are very aligned in the fact that we want to be able to say that we have a positive global impact and we want to leave that lasting legacy. And that's what we're trying to build with Maven. Um, so when thinking about it, like what really drives change in society, unfortunately, like I'd love it that people just want to change things and want to do things better, but really like there's a forcing function that needs to be had, and that's done through policy. So there are all of these climate policies out there, and what we saw that um lots of companies know that there are policies that are impacting them, but they don't really know how to react. They don't know which of those policies because there's so many in the system. So we really felt like we could help companies understand which policies apply to them and how to react, and therefore help companies implement the intention behind policies rather than just paying fines, because that means that the money that companies are then spending actually goes towards like the solution behind this problem.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

Wow. That is such a powerful mission. Love it. It refles the role of a technologist from someone who just built things to someone who actually solves fundamental human problems. And it it's a core belief we share at an O group that uh technology must be in service of an intentional purpose. So I love that. I think for sharing your you know that purpose behind your interest in working within the sector of climate tech. So again, in climate tech, right, success is often measured by both measurable growth and measurable impact. So, how do you balance drive-in revenue with creating meaningful change? And how does that change or shape your product strategy from day one?

SPEAKER_01 8:52

Yeah, so we need to prove that we are a viable business, first and foremost. Um, and our lead investor, who's Perlblue Dot, they focus purely on climate tech. And they also have a mandate to show climate tech companies are successful companies, regardless of the climate angle. Um, so what that means is like you'll see like a lot of the day-to-day is very similar to other companies where our focus is on helping customers. Ultimately, like they're the ones with an issue that needs solving, and we therefore need to come in and solve that issue. But also, then you think about the impact angle, they're the ones that also need to act and they need to have help to be able to do that effectively. So, in terms of how we think about impact, um, we're held to account that we actually measure this as a business metric and we report that to our investors as well. Um and I think like in the future, so the product is fairly young, and what we want to be able to do is to be able to say customers have customers by using Maven have acted in these ways and implemented these things, and therefore not only have we saved them loads of money because they haven't had to go to a consultancy or they haven't had to pay fine, um, but also like they've saved X number of carbon tons because they've implemented this policy and that sort of thing. So, like, although we're not there yet with the product, like that's the sort of um metrics that we then want to be able to report. Um and on top of that, how it also kind of leads into the business is um thinking about the specific areas that we want to tackle. So, I mean, there is a world in which we could have gone for policy overall.

SPEAKER_00 10:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:54

Um, but really like we want to be able to focus on uh well, it's important to focus on a like specific uh sector, but also like choosing that means that we are able to have the impact that we want and need to have, like both professionally and as individuals on the world.

SPEAKER_00 11:14

Awesome. Um and there's a lot of lessons that any leader could learn from what you shared. And you know, thinking about climate tech and then and as you would imagine, like the need to prove value quickly, build quickly, and prove value quickly in a field as complex as climate tech, how do your team do that? And what does a minimum viable product look like when you're trying to have a tangible climate tech impact?

SPEAKER_01 11:45

Yeah, I think um it's very similar for most software products, to be honest. Um, but maybe if I tell you like how we started, and that can be like give some insights there. Um because when we started building Maven, we said that um we want to solve three things for customers. We want to be able to match policies to customers so that they know which policies impact them. We then want to be able to tell them what the impacts and risks are for their business, and then we want to tell them what actions we can take. That's a pretty big product to have to build. So from there, we broke it down. We've got these three things. Let's just start with the first. Um, what are the policies that apply to a customer? Even that, when you're starting and building from scratch, is such a lot to um have to build. So then like the way that um I think about breaking these things down is pick apart the question that a user wants answering. Um, so that is what are the policies that are relevant to me?

unknown 12:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

Okay, so from there I can say, what are the policies that are relevant to me? Maybe I start on like the me part. That's you as a user within a company, but it's also just what about just the overall company and simplifying it in that way? Um, and then what are the policies that are relevant to me? Okay, well, what about um the policies? Which policies do you want are you interested in? And we can say, okay, well, that's climate policies. Is it a subsection of climate policies specifically? Where in the world are those policies? Um, are you looking at active or passive or future policies? Um, and do you want to view all policies or just ones that are relevant to you? And I think that last one is particularly an interesting one because if um if viewing all of the policies is still useful, you can start there because it's much easier to build. Then I don't have to build this whole um relevance algorithm for a user, right? So essentially, like by picking apart this question, the aim is to narrow the scope as much as possible or break it down into little baby steps that you can build that still increment value for users. Because what you want when you're building a product from zero is to be able to build something as fast as possible so you can show it to users and prove or disprove your hypothesis. So we started with and uh the other thing that was really important for us was um understanding what's the most important thing for a user from a tech perspective. So when I say that, what I mean is a user might be most interested in the data. They might be most interested in how that data is delivered, and if they need a UI, then they might be really interested in the UI itself. For us, our product is very data focused. It's really important that that data is correct and that that data covers um jurisdictions, for instance. So um we started with the most basic UI. It was literally just a list of policies. And because we found out that even just viewing all policies had some value for users, very small, but still some, it meant that we could focus on getting and integrating policies into the app. Um, and we did it with a really small subset of policies. We kept like the um data sources that we were integrating with very, very tight, and we chose the one that really was the easiest to integrate with from a tech perspective so that we could show something to users really quickly. And then from there we built it out. So our initial users were really focused on carbon policies, so we focused on that. We created a topic for carbon in the product so that we could label all of these policies. We then looked at um that active, passive, or future. So looking at what is the effective data policies and just really building it up from there and having like the simplest uh relevance algorithm on the app, which essentially was are you in this geography, are you in this sector, therefore these ones are relevant to you.

SPEAKER_00 16:24

Yeah, nice. I love that. Thank you so much for such a brilliant insight, and it still shows that you guys did such a formidable job getting that MVP within such a short time.

SPEAKER_01 16:39

Yeah, worked fast.

SPEAKER_00 16:42

Yeah, I thought there was some sleepless night. So let's talk about AI. How are you specifically using AI to accelerate the development of climate solutions? Uh, can you give us examples of how AI helps you build products that have a greater impact than would otherwise be possible?

SPEAKER_01 17:06

Yeah, so the way that um teams are currently handling this problem in companies is that it's a really manual process. They're tracking policies from lots of different sources, then looking into each of those documents to figure out if those policies are relevant to them, um, and then writing summaries to share with the rest of the organization so that they understand. It's that sort of very manual flow. And what's more, because um there are so many different sources to keep track of, we found that lots of people, even if they do have teams, which isn't always the case, they still struggle to keep track. So for us, we need to make sure that we have the source of truth uh in our product. So that means that we have a massive database of climate policies and we pull from lots of different sources to ensure that we're tracking all of the latest developments within our database. So we now have over 500,000 policies on our product.

SPEAKER_00 18:08

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 18:09

Um, and then to your question, so for each document we apply AI in um a variety of different ways. So when a document comes into our system, um we extract the text. Sometimes we can do that through traditional ways, sometimes we need to do it with AI, with um OCR, and then we extract specific data points that are useful for customers. So I mentioned earlier, like the effective date of a policy. Yeah. Um, and then from there we do topic matching and sector matching on the policy text, and that's done largely through semantic similarity, but also we're building a much um better model to be able to do that um once we have the like labels and uh concrete data to be able to do that. So that's some of the like ways we apply AI on documents that you can imagine with a corpus of 500,000 documents, it's really hard for a human to be able to do that by hand.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:13

Um, and then we also have this suggestion algorithm, so suggesting like which policies are relevant for customers. And then we also use uh a bunch of foundational models within the product um to like understand risks and impact specific to users, as well as a chat bot that's built on our extensive data set to answer user questions. And I think like um how this accelerates uh the development of um like how this accelerates uh climate solutions is really like more building building with experts gives that credibility and accountability. And then using AI gives that speed and breadth. So with our product, we have um a brilliant climate expert, climate policy expert that that is in the loop and helps us develop. So that means that once we have the AI combined with the expert, that's when you get decision grade insights to customers. Wow, that's brilliant.

SPEAKER_00 20:23

And I love how when you mentioned 500,000 policies, I was thinking, wow, that must be a perfect example of you know using AI to augment human capability, not replace it, right? Um, and you're using it to process complexity at a scale that humans can, especially at the you know, the pace that you need it done. Yeah, it will take way longer if you needed to rely only on humans, you doing it, you know, very manually. So your team can make better, faster decisions. And that's the sweet spot for AI's true value. Yeah, exactly. I just love your passion, just so you know, you're passionate about creating efficient systems that enable every team member to contribute, uh, and it just comes through as you kind of describe in the processes. So, what does that look like in practice? And what's one process or tool you've implemented that has unlocked your team's ability to innovate more effectively?

SPEAKER_01 21:27

Yeah, I have to say, like coming uh from being like a few years in engineering management to co-founding and coming back like hands-on, um, it's really made me realize like all the coding AI tools are way more impressive than I even thought. I thought they were good. I'm like, my team should use them for sure, but actually using them myself has been completely eye-opening. And I remember us talking about this um at the dinner we were at recently. Yeah. Um

unknown 22:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:00

And initially I was also like so worried about the costs behind them as well. I think both like financial costs, but also um the concern that uh it can make spaghetti code and I mean, you know, all those horror stories. But um knowing that I have a very senior and knowledgeable team, I've basically set an unlimited budget on them. I'm like, if you have a tool that you want to use, just let me know. We can buy it, use it as much as possible. Um, so I think like those sorts of tools have been fantastic. I always say, like, I basically got like three extra juniors in my team by having my team use claude code or cursor and that sort of thing. But I also think uh how you enable the rest of your org to be able to use those tools effectively is really important. So everyone in the company uses Claude Code or Cursor. They have the they have our code base set up on their laptop. Um, and this is like non-technical people in the company as well. So, what that then means is um people who are much more frequently talking to our customers are much better able to say, okay, actually there's this one small change that we need in the product, and I'm not gonna bother engineering and I'm just gonna do it myself. And what could have been like an hour's worth of coding time for us, um, but then you can't couple that with what 25% context switching time and then communication back and forth between a product person or a customer-facing person and the engineer and helping them like envision what what they want and a bit of guesswork and that feedback back and forth, like at best takes that way longer. Exactly. And at best that's like two hours, right? Or half a day at worst, and there's two people working on that. Whereas like enabling a product person or a customer-facing person to be able to make a small change themselves, and then for us to just do a PR review, it's like one hour for product, maybe, and then 15 minutes of engineering time. Like it significantly like shortcuts that cycle. I think like what's important is you put around the the uh like right guidelines in place in your org. We have vibe coding guidelines that say that uh, I think for instance, one of that is literally just like if the number of files being changed is above five to ten, get an engineer on the call, you're probably going wrong somewhere. Um, let us help you. Or um what's in the other ones? Oh, yeah, making sure all the tests are in place so that like they know how to run the tests, or the tests run automatically on the PR in our case. So we know immediately if like something is wrong and they need to go back and fix it. And we don't need to say any more because they know how PRs work and they can see that something's wrong. Um and finally, like within the code base, making sure there's a really good like agents.md file or claw.md file. And um, for those people who aren't familiar with what this is, it's basically just a like markdown file with a set of instructions for any AI coding agent to use. Um, and that's really helpful when you've got non-technical, non-technical people writing code on your code base because it will say in there, for instance, make sure to run the test after every change. And then the AI agent will take care of that. And you don't need to remind someone to do that. Um, I think the other side of this is complex changes that a product or a customer-facing person are thinking about. By enabling people to vibe code and like just kind of let loose on your code base um in a like constrained way means that they are able to create product mock-ups really, really well. And it's so easy to understand what they're envisioning without them having to fiddle around in Figma for ages. Um, so that handoff has been really good. And I think the other thing with that is instead of just seeing something in Figma, you've actually got a PR that you can look at as an engineer and say, okay, well, this is exactly the style that they were thinking. So I can kind of take that chunk. The rest of it, like, I don't love the code, like, or it's not high quality enough for what we need in our code base. But like that is has been really, really valuable.

SPEAKER_00 26:39

Wow. Like all I'm hearing, in addition to the fact that you're building that coercive environment, is like you're creating that condition for success for everyone in your team. Um, and it's not just about adopting tools, you're building again that coercive environment where the path of least resistance leads to contribution and innovation, which is amazing.

SPEAKER_01 27:05

Yeah. Still working on like how we get it perfect because now that we've had to put in these five coding guidelines, I don't want people to think, oh, I'm not sure, so I can't contribute. I still want them to like try and contribute, and then we can kind of have a back and forth and iterate.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Awesome. I love it. So fantastic, thank you. So you've uh emphasized in earlier discussions the importance of enabling a diversity. Why is diversity not just a social good but a strategic necessity when building technology for a complex global problem like climate change?

SPEAKER_01 27:47

Um I have a really strong belief that if you empower diverse teams, you'll end up building products that resonate across society and that fosters greater equity for all. Absolutely. I think that applies beautifully and very intuitively to B2C companies, especially. Um we're building B2B, so naturally our audience is a bit smaller, but you have to take into account still, like our audience is still just as diverse. We don't know what the like end users um are on our products and systems. So therefore, by having a diverse team, it gives us that competitive advantage because we will be able to better spot um or like understand how to build and design better for a greater section of society just by having like a better section of society within our team. And I appreciate like we're a total company size of seven, so we're not gonna have perfect representation, but even within that, like the amount of different ideas coming to the table is is much better than it would be like if we didn't have diversity within that setting.

SPEAKER_00 29:04

I really couldn't agree, Mo. You know, it's the principle that a homogeneous team will produce homogeneous solutions, which will inevitably fail to address the need of a diverse world.

SPEAKER_01 29:17

Yeah, exactly. A homogeneous team will produce homogeneous solutions for that homogeneous practice like section of society.

SPEAKER_00 29:25

Of society. I agree. And building an inclusive team is a direct prerequisite for building an inclusive and effective product. Yeah, agree. I love this. Thank you for sharing. So beyond a you know, hiring a diverse team, how do you actively enable them? And what does your leadership playbook look like for ensuring every voice is heard and every team member feels empowered to contribute their unique perspective?

SPEAKER_01 30:00

Nice. I'm so glad you asked this because often when I'm advising companies, um, I get asked about hiring, particularly with that diversity lens. And my first response is always um, well, what do you do with your existing employees to support them? And they don't normally connect the dots between, oh, if I want to hire a diverse team, I need to support a diverse team, which I think like to you and I, Magda, because we're active in this space a lot, it seems very obvious. But I think to a lot of people it's not necessarily. Um I think there are a lot of small things you can do to make a big difference. So, for instance, uh quiet people in meetings, uh, they often like you probably know the type where they seem quite quiet in meetings, they're not contributing, and actually like actively seeking out their opinions uh to make sure that you're hearing their voice and that they recognize that like their voice is valued as well. But equally, like these sorts of people tend to have really awesome insights because they're very active listeners, they've been hearing the whole conversation, they're probably thinking things through very well in their head. Um, so making sure you're like seeking for all of the voices in the room is really important. Um, other small things that make a big difference is agendas for meetings. Um, it's just like people's minds work in different ways. Some people are very good at thinking on the spot, some people are really good at preparing their thoughts and ideas for a meeting. So making making sure you're allowing for like lots of different ways of thinking and contributing. And then similarly, having different ways of consuming information. So, um, whether that be like I'm sharing a slide or I'm creating like a mirror board or a whiteboard, um, and all of these different things, I think like mirror is really, really awesome because again, that means that everyone can contribute and it's very like equal footing within that sort of space. Um, and then other things that are more like uh making sure you've got flexible start and finish times. Um I mean, kind of people have lives outside of their job and recognizing that and recognizing that that life doesn't naturally fit into a nine to six or whatever the working hours are. Um I very much operate on a I we as a team, we work really, really hard. I trust you to get your work done when it suits you. If you want to go to the gym during the middle of the day, I think that's fantastic. I respect and admire that, and I would also love to do that. Um and then there are other things that are like more thought-through policies. Uh parental leave being a really big one. Um, when you when you allow equal parental leave, you encourage um everyone to like it but it benefits everyone, right? Because that means that the fathers get more time with um their children. It means that um the mothers or the like typical like female caregiver in the relationship, um, they get they feel more empowered to take all of their maternity leave. Um, and there's a lot of evidence to say that like productivity and employee retention will increase as a result.

SPEAKER_00 33:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:44

Um and then other like other policies include health insurance. Um I think when I when I had and we spoke about this um at the dinner as well, like when I had um when I went through lots and lots of surgeries because um I I have terrible hips, um, having health insurance through my company really, really helped cover those costs that really like um I wouldn't have been able to otherwise. Um and as a result, like it really made me so grateful and so appreciative of that company for being able to support me in that way. And the other things that I found very beneficial from that, it was like a staggered return to work policy. This kind of covers after any long period off, um, making sure you're supporting people and understanding what their needs are, um, and helping to like structure work around that. And I realize I'm just listing lots of things off at you.

SPEAKER_00 34:48

But lots of amazing things.

SPEAKER_01 34:50

There's so many other things that you can think of, like um approach to promotion and compensation frameworks, which is similar to like how you would plan um to have a diverse and equitable hiring pipeline. Yeah. So making sure you kind of approach them in a similar way. And I think like a really awesome thing that a lot of companies do do already, which is supporting um uh like diverse groups within the company. So whether that be like women in tech, um, that sort of thing, but making sure that the like actions, um the actions from those groups really are like valued and acted on.

SPEAKER_00 35:36

You know, the first point you made about you know uh giving people who are quiet in the room um that nudge, gentle nudge to get the voices out and to speak. Literally took me back too many years ago. You probably wouldn't believe me, but I was always the last person to speak in the room. I would need to always be nudged. Uh, and the feedback would always be she's she's the person who actually needs to speak, she's the one who has the knowledge, but she can take longer, but I would be the person who is literally absorbing all the what everyone is saying before I would speak. So it goes a long way to give someone you've identified to need that nudge to be giving that support. And I got a lot of that support, so you probably wouldn't tell now because you might think I speak up, but I've come a long way, and I still do appreciate those who were there to uh give that support. It it goes a long way. Yeah, and you've highlighted a lot of amazing you know support that um depending on where you are in your life journey, it could be a health challenge, it could be a family challenge. All of that piece makes you whole. It makes it a part of you, so ensuring the person can bring their authentic self, they can give their best self to you if you give them the best support. That's really good. And I love that you also made this crucial crucial point because it's not it's actually also creating a psychological safety, right? It sounds like what you're doing, your role is a leader to who is also the chief enabler or ensuring the systems are in place for the best ideas uh to rise to the top, regardless of where they come from. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 37:28

Something.

SPEAKER_00 37:28

Yeah, that's awesome. So thank you. Before we go to the last question, I want us to talk about you know the next wave of tech. So looking at imagine technologies beyond AI, what are you what are you most excited about and how do you see it applying to the climate tech space?

SPEAKER_01 37:49

I was thinking about this. I think um what's gonna be really interesting is probably the mix of AI with hardware products. So things like drones for agriculture, um, which I know like some people are already working on, where you can use drones to understand um health of crops and therefore figure out um what sort of things you need to um like what sort of things do you need to put on your crops to make them better. I'm not an agricultural expert, but something like that. Um so I think that's really interesting. And then um another one which I think is cool is um battery optimization for longer ranges on electric vehicles. Yeah. Um which again, uh I know people who are working on it, and it's very exciting. But I'd really love to see how this can apply to um industries like shipping, for instance. Um I feel like the shipping industry, well, A, it's a big pollutant, but B, like a lot of these new technologies aren't really aimed at them. So, how we can build things that um like resonate with those sorts of industries, and and really what it's gonna come down to is um either policy or um cost. Yeah. Because either someone's gonna have to be forced to implement these technologies or they will want to implement them because it will help make their profit margins. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:26

I love that. Thank you. So finally, um, and I have to say that battery optimization. I'm going to follow up on that one. Sounds very interesting. An interesting space to probably invest in.

unknown 39:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:43

So finally, what is your one piece of advice for a technology leader who wants to pivot their career or their company towards making a more meaningful positive impact on the world?

SPEAKER_01 39:55

Yeah. I mean, I think it's like the beauty of having a career in software is that you're not really restricted to specific industries. So it's easy for us to try so many different things. Um, so if it's about career, like figure out what sort of impact do you want to have. Is that climate, education, equal access to finance, medical? There are so many different things. Um, and then also thinking about what scale of impact are you satisfied with? So do you want to impact like on the personal scale, national scale, or a global scale? And each of those come with aspects that bring different levels of joy and will be like very individual to you. Um when you do want to join a company that's creating that sort of impact, um, if that's what you're looking to do, then um do you want to build that company from the ground up or do you want to come into something that's more established? Um and kind of going through those like with the rest of the like typical questions you might ask yourself when you're either thinking you're starting a new job or a new career or um founding something. Um I think most importantly, like just go for it, don't overthink it. Choose a company or a next step that suits you in terms of what you're looking for at this point in your career, um, and then weigh out things that in a way that feels natural to you. So whether that be culture, learnings, working with specific technologies or impact, um, and weigh those out how you see fit. And if impact's higher for you at this point, then then focus on companies that you feel are doing really positive things in the world. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:40

Wow. And I love this. I always say tech is a driver. It is a driver. So you can work in any industry, but just go with where you find purpose. And that's it. Yeah. And you you said it perfectly. Georgie, this is a powerful and hopeful note to end on. But thank you for sharing your playbook and your purpose with us today. Thanks so much for having me, Magda.

SPEAKER_01 42:09

It's been a pleasure.

SPEAKER_00 42:11

It's been amazing, and I can't wait to follow how your journey goes, and hopefully we can have you on this um podcast again. Looking forward to more success stories from you. What an inspiring conversation. For me, the key takeaway is that for the most complex challenges like climate change, building a diverse and enabled team isn't just a part of the strategy, it is the strategy. The right technology is built by the right team. To follow George's work, please visit the links in our show notes. And if you are a leader looking to build your own purpose driven technology strategy, you can learn more about our frameworks at Anaya Group by visiting anaia.org. Until next time, keep leading intentionally. Thank you.