22 September 2026 15:45 - 16:15
Beyond the Guardrails: Making Responsible AI Decisions in Product
AI is forcing product teams to make decisions in situations where there is rarely a clear right answer. The challenge isn’t just defining what an AI system can do, but deciding what it should do, who might be affected, and where the boundaries need to sit.
In this practical session, Chris Butler explores ethical responsibility as an active process of decision-making under uncertainty, helping product teams move beyond technical minimums and focus on human outcomes. Drawing on real-world examples, we’ll explore how to identify acceptable and unacceptable behaviours, uncover vulnerabilities, and turn ethical considerations into concrete product requirements and critical user journeys.
You’ll also explore different ethical lenses, from virtue ethics and deontology to utilitarianism and care ethics, and learn how to bring values into everyday product decisions rather than treating ethics as a separate exercise.
Expect practical frameworks, thought-provoking scenarios and a chance to challenge your own assumptions about what “responsible AI” actually looks like in practice. The session ultimately asks one simple question: when the answer isn’t obvious, how do we make better decisions?