Dr. Frida Polli, CEO & Co-founder of Pymetrics, on Her Ever-Stretching Aspirations to Impact Society

CEO and Co-founder of Pymetrics Dr. Frida Polli offers advice for current students in pursuit of their impending careers, inciting the new workforce to combine science and business. Roar writers Scarlett Yu and Samy Moschella comment on the interview, conducted by Unicast Entertainment. 

As a prominent entrepreneur in the modern industry, Dr. Polli values the joint approach of high technology and commercialization – where the research and works rooted in scientific studies could be effectively utilized in business settings. Her company, Pymetrics, is suffused with grand visions and core values about the integration of behavioral science and artificial technology to mobilize a robust and innovative workforce for contemporary companies. With this prospect in mind, the company has developed a series of behavioral-based neuroscience games that are capable of grasping one’s attributes in aptitude, personality and cognition. Through the power of neuroscience and algorithm analysis, these tests function as autonomous engines in the area of talent management and selection. Practically, the extrapolated results display individual employee strengths and tendencies with utmost precision. 

Where AI technology is at the core of their talent matching system, Pymetrics values accuracy and fairness as two of the most central and pivotal features in building the foundation and strengths in a specific workforce. In a society where ‘traditional’ conventions still prevail at times, where people’s perspectives are somewhat still bound to rigid stereotypes, companies often rely heavily on a meager and monotonous piece of paper — the resume — to make brash judgements on the kind of profession and role one is fit for. This not only evokes issues of misjudgment or confinement to prejudiced thought, but can lead to lower employee performances. Aware of this stagnant social phenomenon, Dr. Polli devised this brilliant idea of effectively utilizing the power of AI to produce scientifically-accurate results for talent classification and workforce management in order to enhance a company’s enterprising atmosphere. Overall, Dr. Polli seems to have birthed a technological innovation that is set to drive the flows of the global workforce to accommodate towards a radically changing environment in the near future. 

Objectively, her striking accomplishments in the joint field of technology and business are certainly conspicuous and well-praised — unmatched in the global industry. Prominent as they are, one might instinctively start to wonder what kind of a person Dr. Polli is beneath her professional apparel. Moreover, what are her prospects to impact society? And notably, what is the ultimate key to her success? Roar writer Samy Moschella expounds below.

Dr. Polli: single mother; entrepreneur; post-graduate fellow in the sciences; marketer; CEO; dreamer; accomplisher; breaker of stereotypes … 

Truly, these would only be a very limited number of appellatives and adjectives for who Dr. Frida Polli has come to be thanks to her hard work in academia, business and life. However, the interview she gave with Unicast paints her as more than the typical Forbes “30 Under 30”. Most importantly, Dr. Frida Polli stands out to me as the mentor adolescents ought to look up to. Effectively, not only does she make the patriarchy’s misogynistic regard of successful and respected single mothers tremble and collapse like a castle on the seashore, yet proves to us that fair and ethical businesses like her own can strive in spite of the profit-mongering, entrepreneurial tycoons we are accustomed to.

If anything, the two topics contended by Dr. Polli that most caught my attention in her interview were her approach to ethics in the world of science and medicine and her ease in convincing the audience that science can mingle successfully and profitably with other areas such as business.

As an Ethics student at King’s, I was fascinated by Dr. Polli’s sense of right and wrong —paramount when working in science. More specifically, Pymetrics’ CEO denounces the corrupting sway that Big Pharma have on medical providers. Dr. Polli condemns the influence that pharmaceutical moguls have on health providers around the US, prescribing their patients more drugs than necessary for the bonuses lining their pockets. Conversely, the image of Dr. Polli’s Pymetrics which surfaces from her airtime, is one of honesty and integrity. Through third-party audit and respect of diversity in the workforce, Dr. Polli conveys to her viewers that conducting ethical work unmarred by the detrimental and leeching agenda of Big Pharma is possible. 

Secondly, by recounting her most salient accomplishments in business and medicine, Dr. Polli efficiently remarks how science and entrepreneurship can prosperously be espoused. With the MIT 100K Entrepreneurship Competition, the NARSAD Young Investigator Award and the HST Catalyst Award confidently under her belt, Dr. Polli shares the secret to her success. In short, science should not be oligarchic. The key, according to her, is transparency with the public. The more ethical you are towards your buyers, the better your chances at success. Fundamentally, she remarks that the focus is on getting consumers to understand the science employed with simple terms. 

As such, I believe that her ability to waft away the shrouds of mystery around science is going to prove a remarkable ace up her sleeve. Everyone can easily get around in the ethically commercialising tech sector, but being truthful has unbound potential for success. 

The full interview is available here.