Wilkie

Jenny Wilkie

Navigating the Evolution of Spoken Dialogue Systems in Industry

Join us for a session with Jenny Wilkie who will share with us her journey from academia to industry as a researcher and developer of consumer-based spoken dialogue systems. Jenny has an MA in Computational Linguistics and PhD in Dialogue Engineering and is now working as Technical Specialist in Speech Technology and Interaction at Volvo Cars. Her work has provided deep insights into the usability of language technology, revealing the complexities of human-machine interaction, technical limitations to overcome and opportunities that lie ahead.

Drawing from her diverse roles over the past 25-years, Jenny will share some stories and experiences that highlight the challenges and rewards of working in this field. Her passion for hands-eyes-free interaction, solving ‘language bugs’ and navigating the intersection of humanistic and engineering perspectives in the workplace offer a unique viewpoint on the development of these systems.

The presentation will also explore the opportunities brought by generative AI and large language models. These emerging technologies and tools have opened new avenues for innovation in natural language processing (NLP) and dialogue systems in the industry, enabling exploration of previously unattainable problem spaces and applications. The contributions and expertise of linguists and computational linguists will be key in driving the progress of this dynamic field.

Slides