For clients: What are your thoughts on having an AI coach?
Some like the idea of their coach being a machine because it helps them hide from people and keep it transactional. Some dislike it because they don’t know where their information goes and don’t want to engage with a machine that isn’t accountable to ethics. Some think AI helps because it gives them answers without realizing that much of the value in coaching is them learning to find their own answers. Some feel AI is anonymous because it is a machine without considering where the information goes or how it is used. Some believe AI is neutral without considering it runs on a program with inherent biases.
For coaches: How do you feel about AI as coach?
Some love the idea because they see AI as helping them be a coach by taking notes and prompting them. Some dislike it because they realize AI does not have the level of human empathy and interaction required for transformational change. Some like AI because it makes coaching easy and others realize using AI means supporting human obsolescence in coaching.
AI has both advantages and disadvantages for clients and for coaches. Consider the following tables:
| AI Coaching | PROS | CONS |
| For Clients | · Access 24 hours a day 7 days a week.
· Affordability for the Organization – AI coaches for many is more possible. · Predictable process. · Removes emotion which makes it easy to keep it purely transactional instead of going deep. · Freedom to not care as accountability to a machine or responses from a machine are easy to dismiss. · Easy to skirt a commitment to action – if the coaching is based on being “voluntold” it is easy to comply without really creating change. · An opportunity to organize and to plan action steps – transactional. · Data-driven. · Answers questions based on what information it can access. |
· Confidentiality – where the information shared goes and how it us used is unknown.
· Lack of coaching competency and ethics – AI was created and programmed by non-coaches, and it was not built on coaching competencies and ethics. · Lack of empathy and depth. · Lack of ethical accountability. · Democratization – making coaching accessible – is limited because the reality is AI is not used to coach high level leaders. · Missing the human connection. · More telling of answers – which can be inconsistent. · Real change or transformation is limited because AI doesn’t challenge or push. · Missed opportunities for breakthroughs. |
| For Coaches | · Comfortable – protects the coach from full engagement and responsibility.
· Easy to have AI handle notes. · Easy to have AI prompt the coach instead of the coach developing the skills. · Minimizes the effort of the coach in a coaching engagement. · Relieves the coach from listening deeply, staying present, and challenging the client. |
· Confidentiality – the coach no longer controls confidentiality with what the client shares as AI has the information.
· Minimizes or blocks skill development – if AI handles the notes and prompts the questions, the coach doesn’t develop their skills. · AI can replace the coach, so it means the coach is supporting their own obsolescence. · Ultimately clients will quietly quit. |
AI as a tool for a coaching business is also a consideration:
| AI as a Tool | PROS | CONS |
| For Clients | · Scheduling can be quick and easy.
· It might be more cost effective if the coach is more efficient and therefore charges less. |
· Confidentiality – where their name, email, and schedule information goes is unknown.
· Missed opportunity to benefit from the coach’s observations and experience. |
| For Coaches | · Easy to have AI handle mundane tasks.
· Easy to have AI handle marketing by having AI create social media posts, blogs, podcasts, etc. · AI can send emails. · Increase efficiency by assigning tasks to AI so the coach is free for other work. · The possibility of offering more affordable coaching because of time efficiencies. |
· Confidentiality – the coach no longer controls confidentiality of client names and schedules.
· AI is missing the human touch for social media, blogs, and podcasts. · AI emails may be seen as spam. · The more the machine does the less the coach learns and grows. · Risk of misinformation. · Liability for something AI does on your behalf. · The more AI does the less a human is needed. |
What does AI coaching mean for the short-term? Disruption. Conflict in the field. Big financial commitment. Concerns about ethics and confidentiality.
What does AI coaching mean for the mid-term? Great earning potential for AI developers, programmers, and owners of AI coaching programs. Hybrid models combining coaches and AI.
What does AI coaching mean for the long-term? For coaches who use AI as a business tool only and keep it out of their coaching, in the long-term they can experience high-level success. For coaches who bring AI into coaching, eventually they will move to some other type of work.
How do you decide? If you want anonymity, aren’t worried about confidentiality, and are interested in being given answers or transactional planning, AI works. If you want to develop personally and professionally and recognize that means deep awareness and being challenged, work with a human coach.
