Q: I recently started using ChatGPT and am surprised by how “interpersonal” artificial intelligence can be. The system remembers what I say, summarizes my thinking, notices patterns, and challenges my assumptions. Is it possible AI will replace coaches or therapists? Do you have tricks for getting the best interpersonal advice from AI systems?
A: AI will replace coaches or therapists who only paraphrase what clients say or offer simple observations. However, AI cannot replace therapists who bring decades of experience and the depth of a human relationship.
If you want the best advice from AI, remember it only works with what you give it.
Even with artificial intelligence, the relationship matters – because the quality of the answer depends on the honesty of the question. Before your next AI “chat,” consider this checklist:
1. How honest and specific are you being?
2. Did you share both the intellectual and emotional sides of the problem?
3. Are you willing to let AI challenge your viewpoint?
4. If AI points out something uncomfortable, how do you respond?
The answers to these questions determine whether AI becomes a powerful thinking partner – or just an echo of your current beliefs.
One client asked AI how to respond to a critical coworker. After she described the situation honestly – including her own defensiveness –AI helped her craft a calm, strategic response.
Ironically, I’m finding that the more emotionally skilled my clients are, the more they benefit from AI. They tend to be self-aware, open to challenge, willing to examine their contribution to problems, and able to experiment with new approaches.
My clients also appreciate that AI can help them craft emails, plan conversations, and identify patterns that may be setting up problems. Because my work focuses on practical strategies, this type of structured thinking feels familiar to them.
Using AI effectively doesn’t mean treating it as the ultimate authority. AI occasionally gets things wrong. Like any advisor, it’s important to question it, double-check facts, and ask yourself whether the advice may be missing something.
AI has limits. Technology has no lived human experience, and cannot feel empathy. While it can sound supportive, it cannot fully understand how your words or actions will emotionally land on another person.
Where AI excels is pattern recognition. Just as an experienced therapist can quickly see recurring themes in someone’s life, AI can track patterns across conversations – patterns that either help or hurt you.
AI can also analyze complex variables. Many real-world problems resemble what I call “Vulcan chess” – like Spock in Star Trek playing multiple chessboards. For example, you can give AI information about Social Security benefits, retirement funds, and spending needs, and it can map out financial scenarios years into the future.
Using AI analysis can help us calm down, think ahead, and plan more thoughtfully. But we still have to bring the most important ingredient ourselves: the willingness to anticipate problems and take action before they occur.
If a machine can remember what people say, notice patterns in behavior, and respond respectfully, the rest of us can probably raise our game as well. In that sense, AI may end up improving something far more important than technology–it may improve our humanity.
The Last Word(s)
Q: I’m noticing that in team meetings much conflict comes from misunderstandings. Is there a way to avoid this challenge?
A: As the Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw said, “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” In meetings, pause and have each person paraphrase what they heard so the group can catch misunderstandings before they turn into conflict.
Daneen Skube is an author, executive coach, trainer and therapist. You can reach her at www.interpersonaledge.com.
