As the world celebrates AI Appreciation Day, it is a timely moment to reflect on how artificial intelligence can move beyond automation to become a true ally in human potential. Murugan Arjunan, Chief Technology Officer at HerKey, is hoping to lead this shift by building AI systems that are not just smart, but deeply empathetic. At HerKey, AI is designed to understand the complexity of women’s career journeys, he says, which includes breaks and pivots to rediscovery and reinvention. In this conversation with Tech Achieve Media, Murugan shares how HerKey’s approach combines behavioral insights, community wisdom, and contextual intelligence to craft hyper-personalized support. With features like “Make it Better” and bias-aware recommendations, HerKey’s AI mentors, guides, and uplifts women, placing empathy at the center of innovation.
TAM: How do you balance automation and empathy in building AI systems that serve diverse career journeys, particularly for women?
Murugan Arjunan: At Herkey we understand that every woman’s career journey is unique. Our systems are designed to navigate the nuanced realities of career breaks, mid-life pivots, and transitions often shaped by caregiving or life circumstances. By blending behavioral insights, community-led data, and real-time feedback, we craft hyper-personalized pathways for job discovery, upskilling, and mentorship.
Our “Make it Better” AI feature further exemplifies this approach, helping users refine their communication by aligning tone, clarity, and intent. Whether it’s a job application or a career question, the system enables women to express themselves with confidence and authenticity.
Empathy isn’t an add-on; it’s embedded in every interaction. At HerKey, AI doesn’t just automate, it amplifies agency, builds clarity, and empowers women to own their professional journey with confidence.
TAM: What are the most critical AI innovations that are helping reshape hiring and career development with inclusivity at the core?
Murugan Arjunan: Bias detection and correction tools have been game-changers, exposing and addressing systemic blind spots in recruitment and talent pipelines. Equally exciting is the rise of personalized career intelligence: AI that adapts to an individual’s goals, circumstances, and pace. From adaptive learning paths to AI-powered mentorship matching, we’re seeing tools that don’t just recommend the next job but help build long-term career scaffolding. GenAI is helping women become creators, building standout portfolios, personal brands, and content that showcase their skills and stories in ways they couldn’t before. This shift, from transactional to transformational AI, is what makes inclusion sustainable.
TAM: In your view, what does ‘human-first AI’ truly mean in the context of work and professional growth?
Murugan Arjunan: Human-first AI means designing a technology that understands, supports, and uplifts real human journeys, especially those that don’t follow a straight line. In India, where many women face career breaks or mid-career pivots due to social or systemic reasons, AI can’t be one-size-fits-all. Human-first AI prioritizes context: it adapts to personal goals, life stages, and challenges rather than just optimizing for speed or efficiency. At HerKey, our AI goes beyond matching women to jobs, it mentors, upskills, and supports their career journeys with empathy and relevance. We believe technology shouldn’t replace human potential, but amplify it.
TAM: How do you ensure transparency and fairness in your AI models, especially when influencing career opportunities?
Murugan Arjunan: We embed fairness at every layer, as a leader in influencing career decisions for growth and success. Transparency isn’t just a compliance checkbox; it’s a trust-building exercise. Model audits are routine, explainability is prioritized, and critical decisions are kept within human oversight loops. We use Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) and robust guardrails to ensure outputs are contextual to women’s careers. Users always know why they’re matched with certain jobs or learning paths and maintain control through real-time feedback loops. Features like Make it Better empower women to communicate confidently and clearly.
TAM: Looking ahead, how do you see AI evolving in the talent ecosystem? What excites you, and what concerns you most?
Murugan Arjunan: What excites me most about AI is its ability to democratize opportunity, decoupling potential from pedigree and bringing access, guidance, and visibility to talent long overlooked. With AI Contextual job matching, adaptive learning, and AI-powered mentorship will reshape the talent ecosystem into one that is more inclusive and equitable. However, if unchecked, AI can hard-code existing biases at scale. The challenge isn’t just building intelligent systems; it’s building just ones. As AI takes deeper roots in hiring and career development, the focus should be on ensuring fairness, transparency, and empathy, so that technology doesn’t merely reflect the status quo, but actively rewrites it for the better.
