AI & technology for coaches
Henley Business School · 7 May 2025 · Free to read
The AI High: Feeling optimistic but overwhelmed
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.
Also listed under The coaching industry.
If AI only mattered as a productivity tool, coaches could ignore it. Henley’s research is more interesting because it is about how people feel at work.
56% of full-time UK professionals felt optimistic about AI. 61% felt overwhelmed by the pace of change. 60% said they would be more likely to use AI at work with proper training, while 24% felt their employer was not providing enough support.
That combination — curiosity plus overwhelm — looks closer to a coaching and leadership problem than a software problem.
Organisations may not need coaches to teach ChatGPT. They may need help with confidence, sense-making, team strain, and managers who are being asked to adopt tools they do not yet understand.
The report also suggests a market for practical enablement. If a large share of workers would use AI more with better training, some of that demand will go to L&D. Some of it may show up as coaching around change, identity and performance.
We would not claim this creates a guaranteed new coaching niche. It does suggest that ‘how people are experiencing AI at work’ is a live organisational issue, not only a tech-industry talking point.
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
OECD · 5 November 2025
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.
Why we picked it. It is one of the clearer pictures of how small businesses actually use generative AI — and marketing and sales come first.
The coaching industry · Free to read
ICF Thought Leadership Institute · January 2026
ICF’s first futures report uses strategic foresight, not prediction, to explore five drivers of change and four possible futures for coaching by 2036.
Why we picked it. It is more useful as a set of scenarios than as a forecast, especially on technology, access and professional standards.