AI or Human Coaching… or Both?
To ensure I keep on top of the times, I subscribe to HBR’s Management Tip of the Day. Yesterday’s tip was titled “Get On-Demand Career Coaching with AI”. As a career coach and an AI aficionado, of course I was going to take an interest. Here’s the link, if you do too.
The premise of the tip was to use GenAI the next time you need career coaching. It linked to this article from 2024. Being AI-aware, I found myself agreeing with most of that. However, I did not agree with the point about untrained human coaches; not only because I have just concluded my training with Hudson Institute (among 3500 others, as well as tens of thousands of trained and certified coaches with the International Coaching Federation or ICF), but also because the author referenced a study from 2007 and coach training and certification has come a long way since then. He implied from that study that most coaches are bad. Even more, the management tip inferred from the title of the referenced article that
Career Coaching == “job hunt”They are not equal. And human coaching is often outstanding. And AI coaching is sometimes lacking.
When AI coaching is good
I believe that using AI, specifically generative AI such as a GPT, to help with the job hunt is smart. For tech jobs, in fact, it is table stakes. The benefits to using GPT for coaching in general are plentiful:
A GPT responds to what you tell it. It doesn’t have unconscious biases or prejudices.
AI has the whole internet of information available and/or embedded in it.
AI is very fast.
Caveat emptor: It can be confidently incorrect. In other words: GenAI can “hallucinate”. Moving what you think to what you know
When human coaching is better
A human coach, particularly one trained in the Hudson Coaching Method as I am, will consider and incorporate the Whole Person in the coaching engagement. Among other things, this means your coach will help you notice somatic responses and identify what your body is trying to tell you.
Humans can connect with empathy that an artificial intelligence can only emulate, at best. Practiced coaches not only possess and employ high EQ, but they are also self-aware and help you to raise your self-awareness as well.
Unlike AI, humans can often detect what you are NOT telling it. AI such as GPTs work with the information you give it. If you are resistant to change, as most of us are, you might withhold information that could affect the AI’s response. A human can also hold you accountable for the uncomfortable.
A human coach will pursue the “why”, not just the “what”. We work to uncover what is behind the words you choose. Often the real issue that needs to be addressed for your growth is not the issue you come to the session prepared to discuss.
Career coaches, in particular, can provide help beyond finding your next job. Although that may be the ultimate outcome of engaging with a coach, you might discover during your work together that it is time to make a career change. A human career coach can help with transitions, such as retirement, or moving from private to non-profit employment, or part-time, or returnships. They can help you create and execute a path to promotion. Or work on coping strategies if you don’t get one. Or dealing with politics, performance, and leadership challenges.
Combining Human and AI coaching
As you might suspect, there are benefits to both. I am an early AI adopter, and as a coach, I support using AI to augment my practice. In early April, I attended “AI in Coaching and Change”, a panel hosted by the Association of Change Management Professionals (ACMP) and ICF. In addition to what I listed above, the panelists recommended that you consider the AI as an Intern, not an Oracle. Remember, it does what you tell it to do. It doesn’t have all the answers. Neither does your human coach. Only you have the answers.
The panelists called out certain IT challenges that still need to be considered, namely, GDPR, confidentiality, and SecOps. They also underscored the strengths of AI: it is great at brainstorming, at goal-setting and follow-ups, even at providing psychological safety (it is non-judgmental). If your coach is using AI with stakeholder feedback, it can help uncover the words, but only the coach helps to uncover the meaning.
