AI Coaching: The New Frontier for Developing Managers

Speaker A: Welcome to HR Disrupted with me, Lucy Adams. Each episode will explore innovative approaches for leaders and HR professionals and challenge the status quo with inspiring but practical people strategies. So if you're looking for fresh ideas, tips, and our take on the latest HR trends, subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. One of the biggest challenges facing HR is the perennial challenge of leadership capability. Despite years of investment in programs, frameworks and workshops, many organizations still struggle to see real behavioral change. The world around us is moving faster, the expectations on leaders are higher, and yet our development approaches can still feel generic, bit theoretical and removed from the realities of day to day work. But what if technology, and specifically AI could help us do it differently? Instead of a one size fits all course, what if every manager could have a personalized coach in their pocket, One that gives them real time, practical guidance in the moment that they need it most? Increasingly, HR teams are deploying AI leadership coaches to enhance leadership performance and scale meaningful personalized development. And to help me explore what AI personalized coaching can deliver today. Deliver is my guest today, Anand Chopra McGowan, managing director of Valens in Europe, which is the owner of one of the leading brands of AI coaching. Nadia, welcome. Anand.

Speaker B: Hello. Thank you for having me.

Speaker A: Oh, it's a real pleasure to have you on the podcast. So uh, before we get into it, could you just give me a little bit of your career history and just tell me how you kind of came to be working with AI and coaching? Because it. You didn't start there, did you?

Speaker B: Well, generative AI as a thing is only two and a half years old so I am considerably older than that. My professional career um, uh began in the U.S. i grew up in India but then went uh, to university in the U.S. i'm uh, a U.S. citizen. Um and uh, I've lived in London for the last 10 uh, years or so and um, my first. So I've, I've always been in the field of workhorse development in one way or another. And uh, my first venture was um, a business called General assembly, um, that I helped to start uh in New York in 2011 and then move to uh, London to launch our business in the Europe uh, in the Middle east and Europe. We um, we sold that business to the Adeco Group in 2018. Um I then stayed on for a little bit um after the, the acquisition and joined um, a business called Emeritus, uh which is one of the world's largest executive education um businesses. Um and I set up their Europe operation as well. Um and um, I also serve on the board of two, um, really interesting, um, ed Tech ventures. One is called Apolitical which is um, a really large network for ah, government civil servants um, to learn um, how to do their jobs better and show.

Speaker A: Interesting because there is a lot of headlines at the moment about uh, public service competence and capabilities, isn't there?

Speaker B: Exactly. And most of the training that goes on for public servants is uh, unfortunately retrofitted corporate training. And of course the reality in the public sector is very different in terms of budgets and timescales and politics. Um, so uh, Apolitical sets out to change that. And um, then I'm also on the board of a business called Shortlist, um, which helps to find um, senior executive talent from around the world, um, and place them into companies in uh, all across Africa. Um, so that's their focus. Um, and I've always been interested in early stage ventures and using technology to make workforce development better. Um, and in 2018, um, I was connected to Parker Mitchell who was starting um, uh Valence at the time and we had a mutual friend um, who was looking at investing in the business. Um, I got to know Parker and uh, stayed on really after that initial investment, um, as an advisor for about five years, um, while he was building the business. Um, and then around 2024 uh, when the uh, AI product, our coach Nadia was really taking off, uh, Parker and I began speaking about um, what a more full time formal role could look like, uh, particularly given the traction that Valence was seeing in uh, Europe. And so I joined on in March of UH 2025 full time to join uh, our leadership team here at Valence. So that's been my uh, trajectory.

Speaker A: We're really, really grateful that you could find the time with everything that you've got going on to join us today on the pod. So um, let's get into it and let's kick off with a question around perhaps traditional models of leadership development. You know leadership capability has been on the HR agenda for years. I mean my background's in HR for decades and we're still talking about developing leaders and developing managers. Um, and I, from my own experience, despite all this investment, you kind of still really struggle to see any real behavioral change. So from your perspective, why are the traditional models of leadership development, maybe, you know, maybe they never worked, but they certainly don't seem to be working right now. What's your perspective on why they're not working?

Speaker B: Well, I mean there are so many challenges um, for getting large organizations to really change at scale. But I think one of the big ones is the disconnect between theory and practice. We often, uh, deploy leadership development programs, um, removed from where the work is actually happening. Um, and you've seen a trend of, um, programs getting shorter. We talk about micro learning, we talk about these kinds of shorter and shorter sessions that people might do, but they are still fundamentally a different thing from where the work is actually happening. Yeah, um, and what we know about behavior change is that if you don't get the opportunity to practice the new skill in the moment when it's most relevant, um, you don't, you're not really going to change that much. Um, and so I think, um, that's one of the big gaps that leadership development has had. This disconnect between where we learn and where we work. And I do think that technology today can play a role in really closing that gap.

Speaker A: Yeah, I think you're right. You know, this kind of, in the moment practical help, uh, you know, I always kind of, I think, you know, when you, let's say in your human lives, you know, you come across something, I don't know, you don't know how to use the washing machine, um, and you just, that you've just bought, you know, you wouldn't kind of immediately go and enroll on an engineering program for, you know, domestic appliance maintenance at the local college. You would be googling it, you would look on YouTube, you would use AI. Um, you want that practical help in the moment? Um, let's just kind of have a bit of a step back and think about perhaps some of the skills, capabilities. Do you think that what's being asked of leaders, these, these, you know, the skills, the mindsets, the attributes that they're expected to have today? Is that different from how it was five years ago? How is it, how has it changed?

Speaker B: To be honest, I actually don't think that it's that different. I think the things that we need to expect of leaders, that we should, Leaders are even more important, um, than they were maybe five years ago. Because so much of the role of the leader is in setting context, providing clarity, giving direction. And in a world where there is so much more change, where there feels like everything is so much more chaotic. I actually think that, that it doesn't mean that leaders need to do different things. They actually just. It's just more important that they provide that sense of clarity and guidance. But one of the things that I think is perhaps, um, uh, even more important within that is this notion of how, uh, teams and um, uh, uh, colleagues really collaborate together. Um, part of the change that we're seeing is driven by technology. Part of it is also driven by new, uh, rules of work around remote working and things like that as well. And in this scenario, it can be so difficult to get the level of collaboration and communication and interpersonal relationships among teams that, um, is so critical for, uh, underpinning the agility and adaptability that organizations, uh, need to see. And so I think. I think it's less about different skills that leaders need to have. It's more about the increased importance and criticality, really, of the skills that they've always needed to have.

Speaker A: And I totally agree with that. I think that, you know, when, um, we talk to thousands of HR professionals every year and, you know, you were asking them about what are the skills that their leaders seem to be lacking still really quite, in some cases, quite basic. It's the ability to have a conversation with somebody who might be struggling. It's the ability to set direction. It's the ability to not micromanage, but to create an environment which gives them a bit more autonomy so they can kind of do their best work. Um, as you say, it's not necessarily that these are new skills. In fact, these are perennial challenges. Um, but I agree with you. I think the kind of, the increased importance in this disrupted world where things are moving so fast, uh, these skills become even more important. Tell us a little bit about Nadia for people who are listening and going, I haven't come across this product yet. How does it work in practice?

Speaker B: For sure, yeah. Uh, um, Nadia is an expert coach. Um, Nadia, uh, learns about you, learns about your colleagues, um, learns about your company and your company's strategy and values and ways of working, um, and is available in what we call the small moments, the everyday challenges that we all have as managers. Whether that's, you know, a feedback that you need to give to a colleague and you're a bit nervous about it, whether that's a ton of work that you have to do and you're struggling to prioritize. Uh, whether that's a new skill that you need to build that, uh, you're struggling to stay on top of. Um, Nadia can be there for all of those moments. But then increasingly, we're now seeing companies use Nadia for, um, the big moments as well. The big moments and programs that are. That kind of underpin the employee lifecycle, Whether that's onboarding new employees so that they get better connected to the company faster and more productive faster, whether that's, um, performance reviews, which many managers, myself included, really struggle to do. Well um, you know, how do you, how do you balance between just an opinion and real uh, detail. In fact um, all of that stuff that managers have to deal with. Um, we're finding companies really using Nadia to um, uh, in a more, in a more customized, focused way to support those big moments and programs um, that we all struggle to deploy with the consistency and speed and quality that organizations really need.

Speaker A: Um, so you describe Nadia as kind of in the moment, personalized coaching. But what does that actually look like for a leader or a manager on say a busy Tuesday morning?

Speaker B: Sure. Um, well, so uh, we're recording this on a Wednesday. I'll tell you about my interaction with Nadia just this morning. Um, um, I had a, I've got a meeting later today with a colleague, um, that um, who uh, I need to give a bit of ah, feedback to around the level of um, some of the details that we're missing that I've seen I think we're missing in um, some of the client conversations that this person has been having. Um, and so I went to Nadia uh, to say hey um, Nadia, I've got this meeting coming up with this person. Um, can you uh, just help me think about how I should give this feedback. And Nadia gave me some sort of general advice and everything, um, but then helped me by reminding me that two weeks ago I had said something about this same colleague, um, that this person had been working until 11pm Um, a few nights in a row. And that uh, therefore when I go and give this feedback I need to be, I need to acknowledge that work ethic first and be mindful of the scenario in which this person, and probably if I had thought back and looked at notes or something somewhere I might have remembered that. But the speed and pace at which we're all moving these days means that sometimes those little details are forgotten. Nadia has perfect memory so nothing is forgotten. And she reminds me that this is the context in which this person is coming in and therefore the feedback that you give should be one that incorporates that. Um, so then we did a little role play of what this thing might, how I might open this conversation. And this entire interaction was um, about six minutes. Um, and I think that's the kind of everyday support that Nadia is providing. So on a practical basis, um, in this case I spoke to Nadia on my mobile device. Um, but uh, I can go into a browser mode. Um, increasingly we've been turning on a Microsoft um, teams integration so people can just chat with Nadia within their interaction. So it's a very easy to interact with Thing and um, we are, we encourage managers, leaders to bring the day to day challenges that they face, um, to get, get the support that they need and trust that Nadia has the expert context and memory based on some of the most advanced conversational AI in the world, um, to not feel like it's a tool or a uh, you know, an app or something that you're using, but to really feel like it's a teammate and an expert and a coach that you can go and speak to.

Speaker A: So Nadia is drawing on data inputs, uh, from you, the manager, uh, any other data and inputs that Nadia draws on to personalize the experience. And I'm particularly interested on the kind of the ethics piece around that. How do you ensure that it remains ethical and trustworthy?

Speaker B: Yes, well, um, privacy and trust are critical, um, components that underpin the relationship that users and companies have with Nadia. Um, part of that is the way that we design Nadia so that every instance of Nadia is private at the company level and then individually at the user level as well. And we go through very intense uh, testing and validation, um, usually a multi month process. We're deploying Nadia to over 80 Fortune 500 businesses now, um, around the world and it does take quite a long time for the data security privacy teams to make sure that we are actually providing a truly secure and private um, experience. It's also of course in our interest to make sure that we do that because um, if you don't have a private interaction with your coach, you're never going to feel comfortable bringing the true concerns or issues or challenges that are on your mind. And so we need to um, both at a technical level but then also at a training level, ensure that users have the trust and confidence to be able to um, interact with Nadia. In terms of the data that Nadia is using, um, there's three levels to it. Um, the first is access to um, one of the large language models. Um, and so this is, you know we're typically using um, either OpenAI or anthropics models, um, but we do switch between them because you know these, these AI companies are investing so much money to make their models more and more performant and we want to make sure that our, our customers benefit from that, from that investment. So we don't stay stuck on any one particular model. We constantly test all of them, um, and can and can switch, um, depending on which one is most performant. The second layer is um, corporate context. So our deployment team works with each customer to figure out what we want Nadia to know in order to be A truly effective coach within the context of that company. So whether that is your ways of working, your leadership principles, your, um, maybe a learning and development program that Nadia needs to learn the curriculum for so that she can become a practice tool. All of that is part of the design and deployment process that we have. And then the third layer, of course, is the actual conversations that you have with Nadia. So users can share proactively whatever they want. And that can be direct things that you might just say to Nadia in a session. It could also be documents that you upload, um, that can become part of Nadia's memory. Um, and what becomes really interesting is when Nadia starts to spot patterns and blind spots that you may not even be thinking about, uh, based on all of the context that you share over time. And some of those insights will show up in your memory profile of Nadia. Some of them will just show up in the kind of way in which she's coaching you and she'll remind you of some of that. Um, so that's the architecture really of how Nadia is designed.

Speaker A: Thanks, Annan. Right, I'm just going to pause very briefly here to mention our, uh, Disruptive HR Club. Um, so we've got thousands of members, HR professionals who want to do things differently. And in the Disruptive HR Club you get tons of resources, Live on demand training, our own AI agent. So you've got consultancy, kind of 24, seven. Uh, if you're interested, just check out our website, Disruptive hr. And you can find links in the show, notes from this podcast, as well as, uh, contact details for Anand, and we'll confirm that at the end. Right, let's just have a look at the kind of return on investment, the impact side, what indicators or metrics do you use or the organizations that you work with use to measure the value of Nadia, um, and AI coaching in leadership. Because it's really hard, isn't it, to measure, um, progress and performance around some of these softer skills. So what do you, what do you, how do you measure it?

Speaker B: Well, the interesting thing about measurement when it comes to an AI coach is that many of the traditional problems that the HR function has often faced, um, are really solved because you do have access to a lot more data. And you are looking at this in the way that, uh, employees actually work, as opposed to having a training thing happening here and then work happening here. And you have to kind of go and chase people to hope that they've applied what they, what they learn. Um, we are, we are deploying Nadia, um, at the moment of actual work. And so it's. It's actually easier for us to track things. So I'm going to read a couple of examples here. Um, Costa, Coffee here in the uk, um, went from. We saw, We've deployed to, you know, thousands of people. And um, we saw one store that went from an underperforming to the highest customer loyalty score. We saw another store that, uh, increased the team's, uh, net promoter score. Um, uh, because during the holidays, which is usually a time that the NPS really dips at, uh, Prudential Insurance, uh, we saw 78% of users followed through on a career goal that they had set with a career development goal that they had set with Nadia. And part of the reason that we can, um, see that is Nadia is proactive. So she will, uh, nudge you and remind you of things, not just in a generic kind of annoying sense, but in a very contextual, ah, specific thing based on what you've been speaking about. And so that sense of both setting a goal with Nadia and then sticking to it becomes dramatically easier. Uh, Delta Airlines, um, uh, they've deployed Nadia to thousands of managers and they've seen that the time it takes to write a performance review, um, has dropped by 90%. Um, so just dramatic time savings, um, as a metric there, um, Experian, the big data company here in the. Here in the uk, um, did a really interesting study as well, where they looked at, um, they've got over, I think a third or so of their employees, uh, are using Nadia, and they've actually deployed Nadia to all, all of their leaders as well. And they did a cohort analysis to see, um, which, uh, everybody has a leadership effectiveness score. That's a kind of default that everyone goes through. And they could see that those leaders who were using Nadia, um, scored substantially higher in their leadership effectiveness score compared to those who weren't. Um, and so there's a variety of different ways that companies are, um, monitoring and evaluating Nadia's impact. It's typically some mix of time savings, uh, behavior change, um, and uh, just engagement and activity, um, with engagement with the company, that is, um. And, uh. So it's actually quite easy for us to put together a pretty robust scorecard for clients to understand how this thing is actually being used. Um, and I've been on the other side of this where measuring impact is so, so difficult. Um, I wrote an article about this actually in, um, in Harvard Business Review, um, a few years ago. And the conclusion kind of was that you sort of have to work with proxy metrics. Basically right. You hope to make some kind of a connection, but seeing direct impact is just really, really difficult. Um, and of course we haven't perfectly solved that. I mean we're still on a journey with uh, Nadia as well. Um, but we can start to see that those directional metrics, um, quite a bit strongly, quite a bit more strongly than we used to.

Speaker A: Thank you. So let's have a look at deployment now. Um, for organizations that are just maybe thinking about how they can use AI, deploy AI for talent or leadership, what are the kind of key decisions that you would advise them to make or which are the decisions you want them to avoid to get a successful deployment?

Speaker B: Yeah, it's a great question. And um, you know, at Valence, we've now had over a million um, coaching conversations, um, with Nadia. And I do the little air quotes thing deliberately because um, uh, uh, you know, it's. These conversations often look different than your standard coaching conversations. Um, they're not always big picture, step back reflective conversations that you might have with a human executive coach. They tend to be much more acute in the moment, fast moving support that you need. Um, and in so doing we've learned quite a bit about um, where some of that value really comes in. So if, if, if someone, if an HR leader. Today we're looking at deploying AI coaching. I think there is a certain level of benefit that you will find purely in just giving more people access to a coach. Right. Typically this is a elite, uh, benefit.

Speaker A: Yeah. So that whole democratization piece.

Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. And I think honestly that that benefit is almost a given now. We, we believe that in the not too distant future every worker will have some form of an AI coach. What we're seeing now more interestingly and more strategically in terms of enterprise value from an AI coach is when HR leaders, uh, direct and customize and point the coach in service of particular moments and programs where they're seeing the most friction. So imagine you've got a performance review, um, uh, or performance management program. You find that people aren't filling out, aren't doing reviews very well, they aren't delivering the feedback very effectively. Uh, maybe it's taking too much time. That's a great place for Nadia to be deployed. Um, you may have a learning and development program where um, you're struggling to show real impact. Um, that's another great place for Nadia to be employed. She can learn the curriculum and then be a proactive practice tool for employees, um, in perpetuity after that program. Um, so it's looking at your HR Strategy, your moments and programs as you go into your planning cycles and saying, where do we anticipate the most amount of friction? Where do we anticipate that costs will be too high or compliance will be too low or quality will be too low? And then let's talk to um, uh, uh, Nadia and see how Nadia uh, can learn this context and therefore be helpful there. So articulating the use cases is I think the biggest decision that um, HR leaders should make when they're thinking about um, deploying something like an AI coach.

Speaker A: And have you come across kind of skeptical managers who are saying there's no way I'm going to be coached by a robot. You know, um, how do you cope with encouraging those skeptical leaders and managers to come on board with it?

Speaker B: Well, I have a thought on this, but I'm actually curious for your thoughts. You speak to so many HR leaders. Are you still seeing skeptical or concern about AI coaching and tools?

Speaker A: Yeah, I mean I think what we're coming across is that you know, there is still a uh, you mentioned the kind of elite um, aspect of leadership development and I think that there is still uh, an interest from leaders and managers for the elite business school, leadership education, you know, um, and which is interesting because then you also have this um, the biggest pushback coming from leaders around time. So they're time poor, they're super busy. So I think that um, there is always going to be those leaders who, unless they're going to Harvard or London Business School or insead, then they're going to kind of look down on it. But I think increasingly, um, there's a growing acceptance, right? There is a growing acceptance that AI is not the clunky language models that we were seeing before but can actually help with in the moment stuff. And I think for me the more people that use it, your early adopters get on board, um, they see the value in it, um, they, you then get that kind of peer to peer advocacy. And I think that overcomes a lot of issues. You know, let's face it, if something is working, helps you deliver more effectively as a leader and manager, doesn't impact on M time, then you're going to use it. So I think there is um, still some resistance, but I think it's diminishing. Does that correspond with your.

Speaker B: I would agree with that. I mean if you look at the research on um, how people are using AI generally, not just what we've seen exadia, um, wellness therapy, that kind of personal support is the top use. So I think people are getting Actually quite comfortable with that. Um, that said, I don't think that this is a substitute for uh, the step back contextual leadership development programs, um, that leaders have been, have been used to. In fact, I think some of those programs may actually be uh, more important now as we need to create those spaces for true exploration and alignment and learning. Given that the actual pace of work on a day to day basis is so much faster and so much more chaotic, I think there's a role for the HR function to play in creating those spaces for leaders to really, um, to really step back and learn. But look, let's face it, most employees aren't getting to go to an Ivy League business school for executive education program. And if you look at who the users of Nadia really are, they are not usually the most senior leaders in the company. We're talking about, uh, store managers at Costa Coffee.

Speaker A: We're talking about they would not be getting to go to the elite programs and they wouldn't be getting the executive coach.

Speaker B: Exactly. And that's.

Speaker A: Sorry to interrupt your point there about a supplement to um, perhaps more traditional forms of development, whether that be classroom based or peer, peer to peer to peer scenario discussions, uh, which can be incredibly effective. I know there was a few companies that we've been speaking to that use the AI coaching as the kind of nudges and the prompts and picking up on that development as a way of reinforcing it because as an HR director that was always my frustration. You would have this immense investment, huge uh, amounts of energy around uh, the face to face in person development. But it was when they got back to the day job. So actually using that AI coach there can be very powerful. Um, unfortunately we've run out of time anand um, I've got a million more questions. I think this is just so exciting and for all of those HR people out there who are kind of uh, beating their head against a brick wall because they've still got leadership development issues that they appear to have been trying to rectify for decades. I think this could, you know, it's not the only answer but it's definitely some fresh support uh, that could have a really big impact. How can listeners contact you and find out more about Nadier and what it could do for them?

Speaker B: Uh, yeah, no, look, thank you for the conversation. Um, I really do think that we are at a new paradigm, um, of what leadership development really looks like and this notion of in the moment support, um, to make all of the small and big moments that we face, um, as managers and leaders at all levels. Um, more effective. Um, best way to get in touch with me personally is, um, on LinkedIn.

Speaker A: Um, we'll put your LinkedIn, put your LinkedIn connection in the show notes so people can reach you there.

Speaker B: Great. Um, and then you can also look at, um, more about Nadia at, uh, Valence. Uh, co. Um, we've got a bunch of really great case studies there where you can see how companies are actually grappling with the planning and the deployment of, uh, AI coaching.

Speaker A: Anand, thank you so much for joining me today and giving your time and your thoughts. It's been a real pleasure.