AI and Coaching: Why Human Coaches Still Matter

Professor Jonathan Passmore and his colleagues have once again advanced the conversation on AI in coaching by asking a vital question: is an AI really as good as a human? Their recent research shows how far AI has come, but also highlights that the human preference for a coach remains strong. This resonates deeply with my own reflections.

While AI can increasingly simulate the competencies required to pass professional assessments, I remain hopeful that it will not replace human coaches just yet. The reason is simple: coaching is not only about structured questioning or goal-setting, it is fundamentally about eliciting the coachee’s proactivity and their yearning for genuine human connection. Human coaches, when working within robust frameworks, can help individuals recognise that no problem is ever entirely one’s own. Challenges are shared, shaped by context, and resolved most effectively through collaboration.

One such framework is the PROPEL Coaching Model, which I have developed as a practitioner-oriented approach to embed proactivity and human connection at the heart of coaching. PROPEL guides the process through six interlinked stages:

• clarifying the problem within its context,

  
  

• mapping and mobilising resources,

  
  

• creating opportunities for collaboration,

  
  

• planning proactive and preventive actions,

  
  

• monitoring and adjusting progress, and

  
  

• consolidating learning while leading by example.

By following these stages, coaches and coachees move beyond reactive problem-solving into a cycle of shared growth and sustainable change.

Professor Passmore asked what human characteristics might influence engagement with AI in learning and development. My view is that the key contribution of humans to AI is not only in adapting to its presence but in

If AI can be trained to draw out the superlative qualities in people—the creativity, empathy, resilience, and connectedness that define us—then perhaps one day AI could coach more meaningfully. Until then, the human coach’s role is indispensable.

AI may one day be able to simulate technical mastery, but it is the human capacity for connection that turns coaching from a process into a transformative relationship. That, for now, remains our unique advantage.