Server-Side Chats: What skills do employers actually want?

What skills do employers actually want from Pitt graduates right now, and how can students build them before they walk out the door?

Join HAIL for a student-facing panel with members of our Advisory Board, who bring perspectives from across industry. Students set the direction: bring your own questions, and we’ll open the floor for live Q&A. It’s also a chance to meet the panelists, connect with the HAIL team, and, for faculty, hear directly what the workforce needs and how academic programs can better prepare students for it.

Panelists

Bridget Fitzpatrick, Manager of Data Science, DICK’S Sporting Goods (HAIL profile)Michael Barber, Senior Director, Responsible AI, Highmark Health (LinkedIn)Marta Golden, AI Governance Lead, PPG (LinkedIn)Sample questions we’ll explore:

How should organizations think about data governance as AI adoption scales across teams?What does responsible AI management look like in practice, and who should own it?What are the biggest gaps between academic AI/ML training and what industry actually needs?How do you build AI or ML solutions for industries with heavy regulatory or compliance requirements?What skills matter most at the application layer, where AI meets real users and real products?How do you evaluate whether an AI tool or model is ready for production use?What’s a common misconception students have about working with data and AI in the workforce?How do you see the role of AI governance evolving over the next few years?