Automated coaching gives people customized insights about themselves and their colleagues inside a digital application. Adoption ran ahead of evidence. Researchers had little account of the mechanism, and rigorous outcome studies were missing.

The authors applied objective self-awareness theory to ask how engaging with the platform sets off self-reflective processes day to day. Across an experience sampling study of 84 employed users, engagement “significantly increased metacognitive activities on a daily basis,” and the effect spilled into the next day as a higher need for self-knowledge and a stronger learning goal orientation.