Legacy, Allyship, and the Future of AI in Financial Services

Reflections from TechFutures 2025

Last week, I had the privilege of joining Christine Tu at this year’s TechFutures Conference -formerly known as Lesbians Who Tech (LWT) - to co-host a keynote workshop on AI in Financial Services. It was one of those rare spaces where innovation meets inclusion, and where difficult questions meet brave answers.

The conference continues to evolve, but its core remains the same: a celebration of community, equity, and the transformative power of technology. And this year, something felt even stronger - the role of allyship. It wasn’t performative. It was lived, voiced, and felt.

Allyship as Legacy in Motion

While the technologies we discussed - LLMs, autonomous agents, risk modeling, GenAI - are cutting-edge, the human dimension anchored every conversation. In financial services, where trust and precision are non-negotiable, the integration of AI isn't just a technical leap - it’s a cultural one.

In our workshop, Christine and I unpacked not only how AI is reshaping compliance, fraud detection, and customer experience - but how we need a new kind of leadership to responsibly steward this shift. Leadership rooted in allyship. Leadership that listens, that shares power, and that invests in visibility for those traditionally left out of these rooms.

That’s when Billie Jean King’s voice from the main stage last year came back to me:

“Legacy is decided by the other people, not you.”

And that’s when it clicked.

Legacy Happens in the Eyes of Others

You can’t architect your own legacy like a resume. You don’t get to decide which moment will matter to someone else. But you do get to choose how you show up. You get to decide whether you’re building a system that includes or excludes. You get to decide whether your innovation elevates others - or leaves them behind.

At TechFutures, I saw a thousand legacies being shaped in real time: through mentorship moments, first-time speakers, hallway conversations, and in the courage of those sharing their truths onstage. Some people came to code. Some came to organize. Some came to listen. But everyone was shaping someone else's future, quietly and powerfully.

The Future of Tech Is Interpersonal

As we dive deeper into the age of AI, we must remember: technology might be built in code, but it operates in community. It learns from us. It reflects us. And if we’re not intentional, it risks perpetuating everything we were trying to leave behind.

TechFutures reminded me that our role as technologists is not just to build what’s next—but to do so with humility, intersectionality, and intention. Because someday, someone will remember us not for the product we shipped, but for how we made them feel in the process.

That’s the legacy I want to leave behind.

And I know I don’t get to write it alone.