Friday Forum: Managing People :: Invisible Bias
**NOTE: Date updated to Friday, June 12th**
Even experienced leaders make decisions influenced by unconscious biases — often without realizing it.
These biases affect how teams interpret information, evaluate ideas, and decide whose voice carries weight.
For our June’s session Saummya Kaushal will be our guest speaker. Saummya is a product leader and educator dedicated to helping others grow in product management. She has built and scaled software products across consumer and enterprise environments at both startups and large technology companies, including 0 to 1 initiatives in security, fintech, and edtech with a focus on ML and AI-driven solutions. She currently leads security product initiatives at Microsoft and previously drove product innovation and growth at Coursera and OnDeck, while also advising startups on product strategy and growth. Saummya brings a real-world perspective to learning and focuses on practical frameworks, user empathy, and decision-making skills that help learners confidently validate ideas and build products that matter.
Topics we’ll explore:
• Common cognitive biases in organizational decision making
• How bias influences hiring, promotion, and idea evaluation
• Techniques for slowing down flawed decision patterns
• How teams can create better decision environments
The session will include a short talk followed by Q&A and discussion with the community.
If you regularly need to influence decisions across teams, this conversation will offer practical insights.
Have questions or other inquiries related to this series? Reach out to us at [email protected].