Jessica discusses life & Guildhawk’s AI translation with Jurga & David

Creating a culture where innovation flourishes, young people are empowered and customers feel valued, is the driving force in everything we do at Guildhawk. It is inspired by our founder, Jurga Zilinskiene MBE, so, we were thrilled when Jessica Ng, the founder of the iconic Jessica Magazine, Hong Kong, asked to film an interview with Jurga.

Read the interview at Jessica Magazine or watch the interview here:

New AI Powered by People

Jessica wanted to understand how Jurga was inspired as a child to become an entrepreneur, her journey to develop new disruptive AI translation products, and her determination to help women and young people flourish.

The historic Tower of London provided a treasured backdrop for the filming which took place on an unseasonably hot autumn day in the City of London. Jessica also invited Jurga’s husband David Clarke, our Chief Security Officer, to explain how the culture of empowerment is created and how this drives development of new technology, powered by AI – but with humans at its heart.

Inspiring Girls to Succeed

Established by Jurga in 2001, Guildhawk has grown into an international community with 3,000 linguists, in-house coders, and prestigious clients. Jessica asked if anyone can build a community and how you start.

David explained, "The community you build, what you've built, begins with two, doesn't it?... You build a community around people's interests and passions, and from those two, it multiplies into the whole movement that can go global."

Helping women to flourish as entrepreneurs or software coders is influenced by how we treat girls at an early age. "Reflecting on my childhood, I appreciate that I was never treated differently for being a girl; I was simply treated as a child whose opinions mattered." Jurga told Jessica.

AI Needs Human Curiosity

Encouraging girls to be curious and confident is big factor in life. Jurga’s entrepreneurial journey began at the age of eight. Her childhood curiosity led to her first venture, selling seeds at a local market. There she met traders from many countries and developed a passion for languages. Those seeds blossomed into a lifelong passion for languages, learning and enterprise.

The dedication of role models like Queen Elizabeth II inspired her, Jurga explained. Jessica was keen to know what else Jurga does to stay at the cutting-edge.

David believes the secret is attitude, "Jurga's constantly pushing the boundaries with, 'Why don't we do something else with this and help the customer, help our clients, to do amazing things?' So, it's that curiosity... that's the entrepreneurial spirit."

Empowering Women in Tech and Beyond

Jessica was inspired by Jurga's commitment to breaking down gender-specific obstacles so people excel at Guildhawk. This applies to all disciplines including working on revolutionary tech like Guildhawk’s multilingual tools powered by GPT.

"In the workplace, we must ensure the environment is conducive to women's work.” Says Jurga, adding, “we are keenly aware of this and always look for amazing female coders."

This commitment to invest into Guildhawk people has generated amazing results with women recruited into software development roles and promoted into leadership positions. Consequently, staff retention rates and skill levels are remarkably high. This in turn, leads to sensational feedback from customers and development of amazing new software products like GAI and our new Digital Humans.

Partnerships Built on Mutual Respect

Business partnerships flourish when there is mutual trust. The same applies to personal relationships David explained, "The chemistry, the friendship, when your partner has all those strengths that are your weaknesses or your blind spots and can do them extremely well, makes for a fantastic team."

That is the beautiful dynamism all our teams aim to deliver in partnership with our clients.

The journey of our founder epitomises the power of true partnership, solving challenges together, and making amazing things happen together. We thank Jessica Ng for telling the story of Guildhawk, may it inspire future generations of entrepreneurs to be curious, successful and happy throughout their lives.

Connect with Jessica from Jessica Magazine.