Sami Mäkeläinen

Sami Mäkeläinen

Australia-Finland

Sami Makelainen is an internationally experienced foresight and strategy professional with in-depth knowledge of the technologies that shape our lives, organisations, and societies. From building the early online commerce and banking platforms in North America and Europe in the 1990s, Sami has also spent several years with various aspects of the mobile business, from application development to network systems research for Nokia in Finland.

Since 2009, Sami has lived in Australia. He held several senior roles at Telstra, spanning from CEO Communications to Innovation Program Management. He created and led the Strategic Foresight practice for several years, which focused on long-term technology and related trends and how they impact the business, industry, and society at large.

He is currently a Research Affiliate at the Institute for the Future, a Senior Industry Fellow at RMIT FORWARD, the Vice President of Finland Australia Chamber of Commerce as well as running a consultancy organization Transition Level.

Sami holds an Masters degree in Computer Science from the University of Helsinki. He is an extreme learner, and his current research interests include the mindful application of Artificial Intelligence and other automation, the impact of automation on skill degradation, complex systems, and architecting for resilience.

1. What AI related challenge resonates the most with you?
How can we take advantage of these powerful tools mindfully, without breaking society?

2. Which of our Initiatives do you resonate the most with?
There is no one part over the others; all the components are needed – and much more, too. At current time, information and education in various ways is probably key, since there is quite a bit of misconception around about AI, often unintentionally.

3. What Mindful AI means to you?
It represents a genuine effort to do this right. As much as some of us would like at times, we can’t just dismiss AI as a technology, nor can we bury it, or stop the progress. But we CAN decide how to use it.

4. Why do you think The Mindful AI movement is important? In other words, why have you accepted to become an Ambassador of this community?
Doing AI implementation and the exploration of its capabilities mindfully offers our best chance of getting through this transition with less societal scarring than would otherwise result. This applies to things like mindful regulation as well – “mindful AI” sounds like a soft tool, but it needs to also inform some of the “hard” tools, like regulation.

5. What final message would you like to share?
Do not be afraid to talk about AI, even if you don’t feel like you understand it. If you are anxious it could threaten parts of your work that you love, speak up. If you are excited about something you think it could do, speak up. If you’re concerned how it’s being implemented, speak up.