AI & technology for coaches
OECD · 5 November 2025 · Free to read
Generative AI and the SME Workforce: New Survey Evidence
An OECD survey of more than 5,000 SMEs across seven countries, including the UK, finds generative AI in use in 31% of SMEs, with marketing and sales the most common application.
Most independent coaches are small businesses. This OECD survey is useful because it looks at SMEs rather than large technology buyers.
Generative AI was in use in 31% of SMEs. Among those using it, marketing and sales was the most common business-support application, at 49.7%, ahead of IT at 44.5%. 65% of users said it helped increase employee performance.
The report does not say AI replaces a coach. It does say small firms are using it for the work around the work. That is the part we think is worth a coach’s time.
If other SMEs are using generative AI first in marketing and sales, the practical experiment for a coach is probably not an AI coaching bot. It is research, drafting, follow-up and administration.
The report also notes that many SMEs using generative AI have not trained staff, set internal guidelines, or looked properly at copyright and data issues. A one-person coaching practice has the same risks, just with less spare time to notice them.
Used carefully, AI may help a coach do the unglamorous commercial work that otherwise gets squeezed around client hours. That is a different claim from ‘AI will coach your clients’.
This is an external source. Four Corners Coaching did not produce the original report.
AI & technology for coaches · Free to read
Department for Science, Innovation and Technology · 28 January 2026
DSIT’s survey of 3,500 UK businesses finds AI use is still modest: 16% are using at least one AI technology, and 80% have no current plans to adopt it.
Why we picked it. It is a useful corrective to the idea that every organisation you coach in is already running on AI.
AI & technology for coaches · Free to read
Henley Business School · 7 May 2025
Henley’s World of Work Institute surveyed 4,640 full-time UK workers and found 56% optimistic about AI and 61% overwhelmed by the pace of change.
Why we picked it. Workforce unease, not just technology, may be the coaching problem organisations actually have.
The coaching industry · Free to read
Passmore, Saraeva, Money, Diller and Mitchell, with EMCC Global · August 2025
A 2025 open-access study of 556 coaches across 52 countries, conducted with EMCC Global, finds coaches adding digital, team and group work while remaining cautious about AI, with fees varying by service, funder and country.
Why we picked it. It is one of the more grounded practitioner surveys on what coaches are adding, avoiding and charging.