Developing leader competence with coaching questions and artificial intelligence-based tools: Change of schemas and multilevel impacts

How can AI develop leaders' competence at different levels of an organization with questioning behaviors? When AI automates executive coaching behaviors such as open reflective questions, AI can act as a facilitator for developing leaders' competence at an individual level by favoring changes in leaders' schemes. Decades of research taught us that reflection and coaching help leaders become more competent in work situations but the automation of such practice with AI is yet under-studied. We analyzed 23 coaching conversations between 23 leaders and an AI Coach from three different organizations to identify leaders' schemes and their changes, and to understand how automated coaching questions influence schemes at the individual level. Our paper reveals the central place of schemes in developing leaders' competence with AI and coaching behaviors. As main results, we propose a first theoretical model to explain how leaders can develop their competence with AI Coaching as well as an extended theoretical model about the collective and organizational levels of impacts of AI Coaching. Our paper contributes to the nascent literature about AI Coaching in HR by providing a model for future studies and an innovative method for management scholars to bring their attention to schemes in work situations. Our paper also provides managerial contributions for practitioners looking to integrate AI Coaching in training, learning and development initiatives. Because this study focuses on schemes and their changes that are present in coaching conversations, we limited our study to one conversation per leader and we discuss future research perspectives.