Developing leaders and managers is the top priority for businesses for the third year running, according to Gartner with coaching skills recognised as a vital tool for success.
However, as demand for coaching rises, organisations can struggle to deliver coaching to a wider cohort of employees while maintaining its quality and effectiveness. Companies also want to be confident their investment in leadership development will result in sustained behaviour change and deliver a return on their investment for their training. To address these challenges, companies are starting to use an innovative blend of traditional coaching with AI-powered tools to enable leaders to practice their skills.
A new report has highlighted that 84% of HR decision-makers are keen to integrate AI into leadership development—and with the substantial £7.5 billion invested in UK leadership development in 2023, the question is not if AI should be embraced to develop future leaders, but how it can be strategically used to maximise impact.
While AI offers excellent tools for skills practice, they are designed to complement, rather than replace in person coaching. Expert coaching must still be a central pillar because people learn complex skills like coaching best through direct human interaction.
That’s why starting with expert-led, face-to-face workshops for learners is important before using AI tools. In these initial sessions, professional coaches can introduce core ideas and set personalised learning goals. This ensures everyone gets a solid grounding from an expert first. Only then are they ready to use AI-powered skills practice effectively to reinforce and refine what they’ve learned through realistic simulations.
Practicing Real-World Scenarios with AI-Powered Avatars
Following the workshop, AI-driven avatars and simulations can be used to allow leaders to practice their skills and engage in realistic leadership challenges and have complex conversations in a judgement-free space. The scenarios could include:
- Conducting career discussions with high performers
- Managing underperformance and giving difficult feedback
- Resolving team conflicts
- Handling performance review conversations
- Supporting employees through organizational change
By practicing with AI avatars, leaders can refine their communication skills, develop their confidence, and receive real-time performance feedback. The AI practice platform evaluates responses based on expert coaching best practices, providing detailed insights into areas for improvement. This immediate feedback mechanism is essential for reinforcing skills and ensuring lasting behavioural change.
Regular check-ins with professional coaches throughout the programme provide continued support, helping participants integrate learning effectively and sustain long-term behavioural change.
Measuring impact and ROI
One of the significant benefits of AI-powered skills training is its ability to provide data and analytics that track individual and organisational progress. Each participant receives personalised performance metrics and scores based on professional coaching standards. This offers clear insights into their development and progress. Simultaneously, organisations can use this data to measure the effectiveness of the development programme at scale.
By monitoring engagement levels, skill development, and overall leadership effectiveness, business leaders can assess ROI and refine leadership development strategies continuously. AI-powered skills training ensures that leadership development initiatives are aligned with business objectives, driving measurable improvements in leadership performance and workplace outcomes.
Scaling skills development
AI-powered skills practice extends high-quality skills development opportunities beyond senior executives to managers at all levels, helping to build a culture of continuous learning and leadership excellence. Such a programme is ideally suited for groups and is suited to organisations looking to develop future-ready leaders across a business.
AI-powered skills training makes leadership development accessible across the organisation, ensuring that all employees can refine their skills and grow as leaders.
The most effective way to develop future leaders will be to combine expert human-led workshops with the smart use of AI-powered skills practice.
Balancing in person coaching with AI tools helps will ensure new skills stick and behaviours genuinely change. This leads to stronger leadership across the board and gives the business a competitive advantage.
Ultimately, this blended approach offers leaders the best of both worlds: expert support from coaches and convenient, continuous skills practice using AI.
About the Author
Ed Parsloe is CEO of The OCM. The OCM has launched ELECTRIC Conversations, a groundbreaking blended AI-powered coaching programme designed to transform leadership communication. Developed in partnership with Guru Now, experts in AI and avatar-led training, ELECTRIC Conversations addresses the critical need for effective communication in today’s business environment. For more information visit: www.theocm.co.uk
Featured image: mstandret
