Meet Nadia, Your AI Coach: Valence Brings Personalized Leadership Support to the Masses
Valence offers team diagnostics, structured feedback, and guided development journeys to help organizations build stronger, more cohesive teams through growth-focused coaching.
In a corporate world stretched thin by burnout, skill gaps, and an overwhelming pace of change, leadership training is getting an unlikely upgrade—from generative AI.
As featured in the Financial Times, one company leading the charge is Valence, the workplace coaching platform founded by Parker Mitchell. What started in 2018 as a toolkit for team dynamics has evolved into one of the most advanced AI-powered coaching systems in the market, now used by thousands of employees at global firms like WPP.
At the heart of Valence’s offering is Nadia, an AI coach that supports employees with everything from career planning and team management to navigating tough conversations. The bot speaks 70 languages, a game-changer for globally distributed teams that often lack coaching in their native tongue.
“We built it to understand you by asking you questions,” Mitchell told the FT, emphasizing Valence’s goal to create a coach that feels like a proxy for the user, rather than just a robotic response engine.
A Timely Solution for a Growing Crisis
Valence’s rise comes at a critical moment: 44% of managers globally have received no formal training, according to Gallup. Meanwhile, the coaching industry itself is expected to balloon from $3.2B in 2022 to $11.7B by 2032. Traditional executive coaching—while effective—is often expensive, time-intensive, and inaccessible to mid-level managers or frontline employees. Valence is flipping that model, offering real-time coaching to everyone, not just those with corner offices.
As WPP’s Chief People Officer Lindsay Pattison shared, Nadia is already proving invaluable: “People particularly liked the confidentiality, always-on access and personalization. Nadia, despite being AI, is seen as very personal and a safe space.”
Not a Replacement, but a Reinforcement
While some human coaches and academics are understandably skeptical about AI’s place in such a personal domain, the reality is that most organizations are simply not offering coaching at all. In-the-moment guidance, such as preparing for a tough feedback session or strategizing before a big meeting, is where AI tools like Nadia shine.
Rather than replacing high-end executive coaching, Valence complements it—offering a scalable, multilingual, always-on safety net for leaders navigating a hybrid, global, and fast-changing work world.
As Mitchell puts it, “The team is the new unit of creative work.” In that world, a smart, discreet, non-judgmental coach in your pocket might be exactly what modern leadership needs.
Read more on Financial Times
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