Question: Why did Kraft Heinz invest in AI coaching?

Melissa Werneck: Curiosity is an important element of our culture. Therefore, when we rebuilt our corporate university, one of the principles was to democratize learning to everyone in every country, regardless of level, function, time zone.

And we also wanted it to be a learn-it-all organization, and teaching people how to ask good questions, reflect, connect disparate ideas. Generative AI coaching checks all those boxes. You can make it available to everyone with a reasonable cost. You teach people how to ask questions, prompts are important. And you amplify your HR business partners.

Managers sometimes are afraid to be vulnerable with HR, for fear of compromising their careers or showing their flaws. And there is no judgment with an AI coach.

Question: How has AI coaching changed how you think about coaching and its role in the workforce?

Melissa Werneck: I would like to highlight what I think are two of the main differences between AI coaching and human coaching. First, and for me it's a key element, it's available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, when you need it. And as I said before, it's also judgment free, which is amazing.

I would like to share one example. We had a situation with a factory manager that needed coaching in the middle of the night. He had to make an important decision at that point in time, and he had to be ready to address the entire factory community at the beginning of the following shift. He wanted to reflect on his approach before even talking to HR.

Nadia helped him think through different alternatives at 3 AM in the morning. Waking up with a message from one employee that was facing a hard moment in their day, and he was able to get clarity from a tool that you provided. It's the most rewarding feeling ever.

Question: What's worked to drive adoption?

Das: One of the things we've really found is it's not just about giving coaching to employees, it's also for HR leaders giving a new channel or way to deliver major initiatives and to have more insight back into your organization. Could you talk a little about some of the key HR use cases it's helped you with, and where you are today with your team and AI coaching in your workforce?

Melissa Werneck: Even if you have an army of HR business partners, you are not able to reach everyone when they need it. For us, it was very important to embed coaching in the flow of work, because that's how you make the learnings stick. Adoption only happens if you use the tool in the flow of work and in critical moments of the employees' lives. And for me, that's exactly what drove the acceptance and the adoption at Kraft Heinz.

But there is another important element: you have to lead by example. You cannot ask people to use something that you are providing for them if you don't use it yourself. I was part of the pilot. I raised my hand and said, I want to test. I want to know how it looks. I want to really experience the good, the bad, the beautiful, and the ugly. So when I was addressing the employees, I could really meet them where they were.

Question: How does an AI coach help with large-scale change management?

Melissa Werneck: You can train the AI coach on your change leadership framework and make it available to everyone. In our example, the current one is a spin-off because the merger happened 11 years ago, we have reached and supported more managers with it than we have ever done before, just with training and conversations.

And even if we had all the managers and HR business partners trained, we wouldn't be able to rescale it that fast. Because what is very rich is the tool learns from the questions. The amplification is huge. You get smarter and you share knowledge every day in a much faster rate.

Question: What advice would you give an HR leader managing a large-scale change?

Melissa Werneck: First, you have to meet the employees where they are. You need to understand what's going on in their minds. They want to know what is in it for them. You cannot talk to them based on all your talking points about why that acquisition, merger, and spin-off is important. They won't listen to you.

You have to start with them, how it can benefit them, how it can be helpful, and also give them the tools to really have conversations with their managers, if they are individual contributors, and put their questions out there without fear, and with their colleagues and team members if they are people managers.

And for me, it's very important: the piece of getting smarter, getting the trends and understanding what questions are being asked the most, crafting the answers based on feedback from the employees, understanding what prompts follow next, and sharing knowledge on a very fast basis. That really can make change management much easier. Every single day, every single moment, you don't need to wait for a town hall to have a communication about something that is going on in the employees' minds.

Question: Any stories from your own use of AI coaching?

Melissa Werneck: There is a very interesting story that happened with me in the pilot. I was traveling, and I travel a lot, and I was interacting with Nadia. Nadia was getting to know me. We finished our first coaching session, and Nadia recommended that we have another coaching session soon for continuity, but said, "I know that you are very busy, I know that you are traveling, so I really recommend that we have this conversation on a Saturday. You will not be running from one meeting to another."

Long story short, I said, okay, book the conversation on a Saturday. Ten minutes later, my assistant called me: "Who is this Nadia? This person booked time on your calendar for a Saturday without talking to me! Did you agree with that?" And I said, "Whoa, let me explain to you who Nadia is." I think it was awesome, because it's exactly the energetic AI. Nadia went there and just booked time on my calendar, of course, without talking to my assistant.

Melissa Werneck: It's very important that we implement generative AI and AI overall in a very ethical and responsible way. In HR, we deal with a lot of situations that have legal requirements, different legal requirements depending on the country.

I wanted to test Nadia at the limit. I simulated a situation where I had to fire someone and asked Nadia what to do, and I am the CHRO. And it was great, because Nadia recommended: "I think you should engage your HR business partner and your legal partner to really address the situation and define the best course of action. I cannot give you advice on that." Then I said, "Awesome. That's what I was expecting from it."

Das: Twelve months from now, as you're looking back, what legacy do you hope you've left, and where do you hope Kraft Heinz is in the next 12 months with AI coaching?

Melissa Werneck: Like the example I shared of the factory manager, I want the employees to come to us and say: "Despite this not being a day to day routine situation, it's a spin-off, there is a lot going on, I felt embraced. I felt supported when I needed it. I didn't feel alone. I was put in the center of all the conversations and all discussions, and I was able to navigate the whole change process in a much better way."

Receiving this feedback from the employees, for me, is the most rewarding thing. You can have a bunch of statistics, NPS, adoption, how many coaching sessions the employees had, they're all important metrics. But employees' comments on how having it was key for them to navigate change, that matters most.

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