In an unpredictable world, coaching has become more than a development tool; it’s an anchor for leadership. That was the central message at the Future of Work Summit: Coaching and Leadership in a Changing World, where speakers and practitioners explored how curiosity, connection, and courage can help leaders thrive amid disruption.
Hosted by IMD and ICF Switzerland, the two-day hybrid event on 30–31 October at IMD in Lausanne brought together global leaders, HR professionals, executive coaches, and corporate decision-makers to reimagine how coaching can drive sustainable transformation across organizations and society.
Anchoring leadership through change
Opening the summit, Séverine Jourdain, Executive Director of Coaching and Leadership Excellence at IMD, set the tone with a call for reflection and renewal. “We are living in a turbulent world where the leadership code has changed,” she said. “The majority of our coaches and leaders are somehow lost.”
Her message underscored the need for connection and curiosity, themes echoed by David Bach, IMD President and Nestlé Professor of Strategy and Political Economy. “You can’t teach somebody tennis by explaining how the serve works,” he noted. “You’ve got to give them a racket and real-time feedback. Learning comes from a combination of challenge and inspiration, and no part of our community does it more effectively than all of you coaches.”
That idea – learning through experience – ran through the morning’s sessions of the first day. Christian Schmeichel, SVP and Global Head of People & Culture Services at SAP, described coaching as a critical anchor for transformation. “We’re living in times of unprecedented change, and we need to recognize that one needs support to manage this transformation successfully. Coaching can be that support system for all layers of the organization.”
Another panel on “Building a Coaching Culture,” featuring Andreina González (Nestlé), Donna Latin (Novartis), Simon Reber (Alpiq), and Schmeichel, explored how organizations are turning coaching into an everyday leadership habit. “A coaching culture only sticks when it’s structurally anchored along the employee journey,” said Reber. “People need to experience it in how they’re developed, not just hear about it.”
Rather than a perk for executives, coaching is increasingly viewed as a system-wide capability, one that fosters resilience and adaptability across entire organizations.
Sessions throughout the summit explored how different forms of coaching, from systemic and team coaching to executive and AI-enabled approaches, are shaping this new leadership landscape, reflecting a growing recognition that sustainable transformation depends not just on individual development, but on how organizations learn and grow collectively.
Together, they reflected a growing recognition that sustainable transformation depends not just on individual development, but on rethinking how organizations learn and grow collectively. Building on that, coaching pioneer David Clutterbuck challenged participants to consider what happens when things go wrong. “When there’s a crisis in an organization, do we go back to command and control, or do we increase the emphasis on creative dialogue? That’s the real test of a coaching culture.”
When human and machine learning converge
Technology, particularly artificial intelligence, dominated the conversations on the first afternoon. In a keynote and panel moderated by Misiek Piskorski, IMD’s Dean of Executive Education, speakers from Nestlé, EY, ICF, and TBA explored how learning and coaching can evolve alongside intelligent systems.
“We’ve been hacking at AI for 70 years, but only now has it truly come out of the lab and entered our daily lives,” said Piskorski. “The question is not whether AI will be part of coaching, but how we choose to shape that future.”
Mikala Larsen, Head of Corporate Learning, Development & Leadership at Nestlé, offered a glimpse into that future: “The AI coach we’re using listens to who you are. It probes until it chooses one methodology that works for you. That’s a big advantage because it teaches our people to self-coach.”
In two IMD masterclasses, Sarah Toms, Chief Innovation Officer, and José Parra Moyano, Professor of Digital Strategy, showcased how digital experimentation and ethical design are redefining the learning experience. “Unless we apply it, we don’t actually learn it,” said Toms. “If we make learning passive, we’ll forget 80-90% of that information in a heartbeat.”
Parra Moyano added, “AI is a productivity technology, not a replacement technology. The question isn’t whether it takes our jobs, it’s how we redesign work to get the most out of it.”
Leading with purpose through uncertainty
If day one examined how technology is reshaping learning, day two turned to the human side of transformation, exploring how curiosity, courage, and compassion sustain leaders through uncertainty.
In a highly engaging keynote on “The New Rules of Change,” Michael Bungay Stanier, author of The Coaching Habit, reminded participants that lasting transformation begins with curiosity. “The heart of coaching is staying curious a little bit longer,” he said. “It’s about resisting the temptation to jump in and tell people what to do.”
Susan Goldsworthy, IMD Professor of Leadership, Communications, and Organizational Change, reinforced that leadership transformation starts with self-awareness. “The most powerful coaching starts with connection – to self, to others, and to purpose,” she said.
Julia Binder, IMD Professor of Sustainable Innovation and Business Transformation, widened the lens to include the sustainability and societal challenges confronting leaders today. “We can’t wait for the storm to pass,” she said. “We must learn to dance in the rain – to lead courageously, not despite uncertainty, but because of it.”
Participants also heard a powerful case study from Petra Bohnisch, Global Head of Leadership at BSH Home Appliances Group, who shared how her organization is embedding a behavioral system for leadership transformation. “At the end of the day, our role is not just to teach or enable transformation,” she reflected. “In transformation, you have to love people.”
The future of leadership is human
Across both days, a shared message emerged: in a world defined by technological disruption, social and geopolitical instability, and relentless organizational change, coaching remains the most human technology we have; a discipline that helps leaders learn faster, lead with empathy, and create meaningful impact.
“Coaching is not just an enabler or a catalyst – it’s now a content in itself, a transformative journey that equips leaders to become who they need to be,” said Jourdain.
Her reflection was echoed by Albina Koch, President of ICF Switzerland, who added, “The future of work is not only about digital transformation or strategy decks, but also about our human transformation. It’s about dreams, fire, and resilience, what technology doesn’t have.”
Together, their words captured the spirit of the summit: the idea that the future will not be built by machines or strategies alone, but by people willing to lead with awareness, connection, and courage.
