Kate Macartney: “The biggest thing each person can do is just get familiar with what this thing is.” | Photo courtesy of MVM Strategies.
Formidable this week is rolling out a five-part series on AI. Today’s story features Formidable member Kate Macartney, founder and CEO at MVM Strategies, a consulting firm that works with companies on AI frameworks.
Monday: How women are leading in AI.
Tuesday: The women rewriting AI’s power map.
Wednesday: The AI arms race comes to big law.
Tomorrow: Kate Macartney reveals how she uses AI and why she doesn’t pay attention to gender bias.
What you probably already know: Confused by the splash of conflicting information surrounding AI? You’re not alone. Several reports say AI could be coming for your job, while one recent Gartner report projects the technology will begin creating jobs in 2028. AI is heavily biased against women, yet one female entrepreneur has built an AI jobs-oriented platform to help younger workers find employment. Companies like Expedia use it for everything from hiring to core business functions, while Lumen Technologies is all in on using AI to streamline workflows. AI has the potential to disrupt U.S. elections, and surveys show AI makes Americans “nervous.” The flood of information can feel like quicksand — the more you try to stand firm, the deeper you sink.
Why it matters: Kate Macartney tries to ignore the noise. Macartney has a long career in change management and opened her own firm, MVM Strategies, in January 2024 dedicated to “ensuring organizations are AI ready. Navigating the vast landscape of AI can be daunting.” Though she focuses her business on enterprise organizations, she says it’s “incredibly important” for people to play around with AI on their personal time to better understand it. “She says organizational-wide change management starts with individuals opting in. “When you have the executive lead by example you’re going to have a different adoption success, but every single person has to opt in and make that decision at the individual level.”
What it means: Before starting MVM, Macartney spent 11 years as an account director at Bridge Partners, where she spent a lot of time working with Microsoft. AI, she recalls, became a “very valuable tool” for her back in 2023 and, while it has advanced significantly since then, its rapid evolution convinced her there was a need for a business built around teaching others how to use “this incredible new way of work. “I first played around with it as more of a search engine,” she says. “It was very much like a research tool at that point.”
What happens next: Macartney, who recently hosted AI training sessions for Formidable members (with two more upcoming), is reluctant to predict exactly how the technology will unfold but admits it’s not going away. She notes that big tech leaders are intensely debating AI ethics, with a focus on data privacy, algorithmic bias and balancing rapid commercial innovation with guardrails. “There’s a lot of fear in the market, and there are enough people raising their hands to ensure we’re using this responsibly enough, and that we have safeguards,” she says, noting recent remarks by the Pope on responsible AI use. “Right now, I think the biggest thing that each person can do is just get familiar with what this thing is and what their comfort level is.”
