None of them has a STEM degree. Mustafa Suleyman (CEO, Microsoft AI). Daniela Amodei (President, Anthropic). Alex Karp (CEO, Palantir). Sam…

Elke Kraemer

Helping tech companies retain & attract more women in tech to boost innovation | Founder Clusity, the community of women in tech in Belgium

None of them has a STEM degree. Mustafa Suleyman (CEO, Microsoft AI). Daniela Amodei (President, Anthropic). Alex Karp (CEO, Palantir). Sam Altman (CEO, OpenAI). 💡 One dropped out of Oxford. 💡 One has a philosophy PhD and a law degree. 💡 One has a bachelor's degree in English Literature. 💡 One did two years of computer science at Stanford, never finished. And yet, they run four of the most important AI companies on the planet. Recent, LinkedIn's Economic Graph report (Aug 2026) shows that if you're trying to get into a well paid AI role "the normal way" (applying, interviewing, getting hired) 98% of the highest paying AI jobs require a bachelor's degree or higher (link to the report in the comments). Result of the "Normal way" researched by Linkedin: Women make up 26% of new AI hires, and 18% to 26% in the best paid leadership roles like Head of AI, Director of AI, and Member of Technical Staff. But, none of these four did it like this. They didn't climb the ladder. They didn't break a glass ceiling. They built their own building, and brought in a technical partner: 💥 Suleyman built DeepMind next to Demis Hassabis (BA in CS). 💥 Daniela Amodei built Anthropic next to her brother Dario, a physics PhD. 💥 Altman built OpenAI next to Ilya Sutskever (Phd in CS). 💥 Karp built Palantir with a founding team of Stanford engineers. To all tech companies, HR, TA experts: don't miss out on brilliant talent because someone doesn't have the right diploma. Look beyond, and see women like Daniela. She proves the same move works for a woman and men. Vision, ambition, the guts to start something, paired with the right technical partner, got her to president of a $60B+ AI company. This is a playbook women can use too. Would you recognise a woman with vision? With Clusity | The women in tech community, we help tech companies shine a light on the female talent already inside their organisation. Wouldn't it be time to shed that same light on your own women? Curious how this looks for your team? Let's talk.

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