In this episode of the Inspire Podcast, Bart Egnal speaks with Rachel Cossar, co-founder and CEO of Virtual Sapiens, about how AI is transforming leadership communication training. Drawing on her own journey from the professional world of ballet to expert in non-verbal communication, Rachel explains how her experience in performance and body awareness led to the creation of an AI-powered communication coaching platform.
Together, Bart and Rachel explore why AI can be such a powerful complement to facilitated training and executive coaching, especially when it comes to practice, repetition, feedback, and accountability. They discuss their collaboration with The Humphrey Group, including how THG has trained the platform on their own IP and is integrating AI coaching into their programs to help participants build confidence and measure improvement over time.
The conversation also examines the limits of AI, why human facilitation remains essential, and how the future of communication training will combine technology with human connection. A fascinating look at the evolving role of AI in helping people become more effective, authentic, and inspiring communicators.
Learn more at www.virtualsapiens.co/
00:19 Show intro
00:57 Introducing Rachel and Virtual Sapiens
02:29 Rachel’s background
02:48 Started off in ballet
03:17 Body awareness and presence
04:21 What dance training made her realize about office life
05:04 Starting her new career
05:26 Consulting with the hospitality industry
06:34 The “always on” nature of hospitality
07:23 Silent service
08:36 How this applies to executive and leadership development
09:06 How the COVID disruption changed her work and business
09:28 The idea for Virtual Sapiens
09:49 How do you take training and truly make it muscle memory?
10:55 Rapid adoption of video during COVID changed things
12:57 How did Virtual Sapiens come to be?
13:30 Initial product: a video sidekick coach
15:02 How did people respond to AI feedback?
15:53 People now have overly high expectations of AI
16:53 The complexities of video avatars
17:55 Why Virtual Sapiens was a natural fit for coaching firms
18:31 The asynchronous practice tool
19:26 How Virtual Sapiens fits with The Humphrey Group
19:47 The Humphrey Group’s “ELI” tool
20:13 Learners can see measurable improvements
20:49 Where is AI used best in facilitation and training?
21:44 Designing programs with more longevity
23:59 Scalable and concurrent learning
24:36 Why people find AI to be a safe space to practice
25:03 The fear of being judged
25:41 Why people prefer first reps with AI
26:23 Built-in accountability for learners
27:15 Post-facilitation tools and practice
29:36 Do people use it?
29:50 Why getting people on early is key
31:52 What is the future of Virtual Sapiens?
32:40 More task-specific LLMs
33:29 Where can people learn more
Rachel Cossar: We as participants have this fear of being judged, right? We, Right ... that's why getting up in front of our peers and, like, trying this presentation for the first time feels so awful, 'cause you're so worried that people are gonna be like, "You're garbage."
Bart Egnal: Right.
Rachel Cossar: Even if people are absolutely not gonna do that, we have this fear.
It holds us back.
Bart Egnal: Welcome to the Inspire Podcast, where we examine what it takes to intentionally inspire. I'm your host, Bart Egnal, president and CEO of The Humphrey Group. And if you've ever asked yourself how can you develop an authentic leadership presence, or how can you tell stories that have people hanging off every word, well, then this podcast is for you.
And it's not just for executives. This is a podcast for anyone who wants to influence and inspire others in their work, but also in their life.
So my guest on today's episode of the Inspired podcast is Rachel Cossar, and Rachel's the co-founder and CEO of Virtual Sapiens. , and Virtual Sapiens is a company that the Humphrey Group is very proud to be working with and partnering with, which really brings AI into the practice and application of what we teach, which is leadership communication.
So Rachel, thank you for coming on the podcast. Thank you for not sending an AI agent to do this conversation. We haven't hit that yet, so nice to have you here.
Rachel Cossar: Yes. Thanks for having me. I would never do that.
Bart Egnal: Yeah. Well, I know at some point we'll we both just have virtual agents recording this podcast.
So but I think, you know, joking aside, it is the human that's at the heart of communication, but augmented and supported by AI that we're gonna be talking about today. and, and that's really why I wanted to have you on to talk about. I think, you know, at this moment in time with the proliferation of AI tools, whether it's for writing, for preparing, you know, a slide deck or for communication, people are wondering, you know, "What is the role of AI in making me an effective communicator and [00:02:00] making me an effective leader?"
And you obviously have dedicated years, time, and energy to creating something, a tool that supports that. And so that's why I wanted to have you on to talk about Virtual Sapiens, and we can talk about why the Humphrey Group has chosen to partner with you.
Rachel Cossar: Let's get into it.
Bart Egnal: So let me, let me start with your background because you took a, a, a secure this route, I would say, to being a, a, a tech pioneer and, a co-founder and CEO.
Tell us about how it all started for you.
Rachel Cossar: So I, I'm Canadian, which is, you know, something I share with you in the Humphrey group crew. But I moved to Boston in two thousand six to join the Boston Ballet, danced professionally with a company for 10 years, and then, retired due to an unfortunate injury that just wasn't, wasn't going away.
But, the whole first part of my professional career was as a performer. And as anyone who's seen a ballet knows, that type of performance is all non-verbal expression. And so when I retired Yeah, I entered the, the workforce as a fundraiser actually at Harvard. That was my first, like, desk job.
Rachel Cossar: Nine to five normal job. And I had this really, I think I discounted it at the time, but I, I came to know in the first year of, of working this, you know, normal job, that I had this very unique perspective around body awareness- Mm-hmm ... and presence, and essentially non-verbal communication.
Bart Egnal: And just- And what did you notice?
Like bringing that to that first job, what, what stood out to you?
Rachel Cossar: Yeah, so it was actually other people's way of responding to me. Hmm. people would like frequently be like, "What? Oh, Rachel, like the way you hold yourself, and the way you walk into the room," and, "Oh," it's like everyone was always noting it.
and, and so that was interesting to me. N- not surprising because I was used to, you know- Mm-hmm ... dancers have a way of walking. Dancers have a way of moving obviously, right? Like it's, we're, we're so physically attuned. But, I think the juxtaposition of this like [00:04:00] professional performance career On top of like a pretty normal, mundane- Right
like entry-level job was so stark that it was no- Mm ... it was just mentioned like all, all the time. And then that, and then I guess my own observations that kept coming up of, "Oh, well if I was, if I was this person, like I, I, I wouldn't have walked on stage like that. I would have-" Mm ... "looked at the audience in a different way," and you know, "Why didn't they do that?
When did..." You know, and it's kind of- Right ... in realizing that I have this wealth of experience and training and knowledge that's actually deeply valued in- Right ... these other organizational settings.
Bart Egnal: So you start, people start noticing you, but you also started realizing that this ability, this body awareness, this understanding of presence was not uniformly held and could be something that you had a, a skill and talent to apply for people in organizations.
And, and then I guess that led to your next career then, ultimately.
Rachel Cossar: That's exactly right, yeah. I, I, , started building my own [00:05:00] body of work, so to speak.
Bart Egnal: Pardon the pun. And what was that work? What did you start doing?
Rachel Cossar: So the very first space actually that I, , was testing out- Mm-hmm ... workshops, essentially, coaching people how to become more aware of their bodies and understanding some of the power that they have to communicate messages in a non-verbal way, was in the hospitality industry.
So I actually worked with front of house staff- Mm ... at some of the more notable restaurants in Boston. I just have always had a huge passion for hospitality. It's so similar to performance. And so I started, coaching and training front of house staff at, , some of the finer dining inst- institutions in Boston and, and I had mentioned it to a colleague at Harvard, and she was like, "Well, that sounds like it would be really helpful for, for like everyone here, especially the frontline fundraisers."
Bart Egnal: Hmm.
Rachel Cossar: And that was kind of the first like, oh, interesting, like translatable skills.
Bart Egnal: Right. A- and I'm curious, when you work with hospitality people, what, what was like [00:06:00] the most important thing you would tell them or help them do that improved their ability to serve and, and create a great experience for diners?
Rachel Cossar: So, , , two, two, two things I, that, that I always try to really emphasize. One of them was that especially in, in a restaurant, there's no time in or at which s- some... Like, no one's looking at you, right? Hmm. The, the, the likelihood of someone always seeing you, even if you're, you know- Right ... in the back corner with your back turned and la, la, la, like, is, is high.
Like, it's too dynamic of a space. People are walking to the restroom. People are- Right ... looking up and, like, wondering where their food is, right? So the... Just, just to develop a constant sense of awareness of how other people may be perceiving you and how you may be reflecting the brand-
Bart Egnal: Right ...
Rachel Cossar: was something that I wanted people to be- Okay
aware of, right? Good take for it. Because, and again, we're talking about, like, restaurants where people are gonna be dropping relatively high-
Bart Egnal: Mm-hmm ...
Rachel Cossar: checks, right? And [00:07:00] so the experience, much like at the theater where you walk in and, like, it's the sounds, it's the smells, it's the sights, it's all of that together continuously creates your experience.
It's not about just the performer- Right ... on the stage, right? It's not about just putting the plate on the table. It's, right, it's about how you interact with people. It's a- it's about, like, how you walk away, how you... Right? And so, so that was one thing. The other thing- Mm-hmm ... which can be called, like, silent service is, like, paying attention to the cues of the diners because oftentimes one of the biggest pet peeves of diners is, like, being interrupted-
Bart Egnal: Right
Rachel Cossar: constantly, and that can't really be happening if you... Like, if you're at an institution, again, where you expect hospitality to be at a certain level. So I would always say, like, listen. It's not, it's not like you have to be, like, body language experts, but notice the lull in conversation. Perfect.
That's perfect for you to go [00:08:00] in. Like, if people are, like, really close and really intense about something, like-
Bart Egnal: Don't, don't offer them an appetizer at that time ...
Rachel Cossar: right, or just, like, circle around so they see you coming and have- Mm ... an opportunity to, "Oh, let's just table this for a second." Right. Right? So there's this natural...
Because people, like I said, like, people are paying attention. They're looking around. There's cues, and, and if you see the waiter approaching With enough time for you to be like- Mm-hmm ... all right, this is, you know. Or if they totally ignore you, maybe, like, l- loop around again and, like, go do something else for a moment, right?
It's those little things I think you can really develop and just create a much more- Mm-hmm ... a much more supported dining experience.
Bart Egnal: And, and I can see the applicability into, you know, executive development, leadership development. Talk- I mean, you're, you're always on stage, you know, to extend the metaphor- Yeah
when you're, when you're a leader, and that intentional presence and that connection is critical. And so I'm not surprised that, that you then built a practice in that space. But then fast-forward, the pandemic hits, [00:09:00] and suddenly, you know, the restaurants- Oh ... you know, to take it back to restaurants, right, restaurants shut down, and the practice- Yeah
leadership becomes virtual. Yes. Well, what happened then in your work, and how did that lead you to creating Virtual Sapiens?
Rachel Cossar: So when the pandemic started, right, I was all gung ho about amazing experiential in-person workshops. I was like, "It's the only way," and la, la, la. And I still think that they're one of the more impactful ways of learning.
But that being said, you know, even going into the pandemic, I was like, "Yeah, but, like, what happens, like, after this workshop that I do? And how can we get people to actually integrate these skills?" Like, especially again, coming from this background in, in dance where we would repeat, and repeat, and repeat the same movement or the same collection of movements over and over again to get it to the point where it actually is your muscle memory.
It is like it feels like second skin. Takes a while. It takes pra- like, none of it happens overnight, right? You can watch choreography and be like, "Okay, yeah," and then you stand up and you realize none of it's ingrained in [00:10:00] your body and you don't actually know it, right? Like, conceptually, you understand it.
So, so that was always a little bit of a thorn in, in my mind as in the work that I was doing in workshops, and coaching, and all that. And then when the pandemic happened, I actually saw it as an opportunity because one of the biggest barriers to introducing any technology into the training space Prior to the pandemic was that people were not on video.
Bart Egnal: Right.
Rachel Cossar: Like, people weren't comfortable on video. If you did telecommute, it was audio only, right? Right. The Zoom-
Bart Egnal: Call into the conference bridge.
Rachel Cossar: Right. Yeah, like Z- Zoom had just come on the scene- Mm-hmm ... prior to the pandemic, but it wasn't, like, it wasn't a behavior.
Bart Egnal:
Rachel Cossar: And if, if people don't have the behavior, or at least the baseline behavior, y- you know, the challenge of incorporating technology into training becomes more about getting people on video than it does about getting them- Mm-hmm
to actually engage in a practice session. So, so once video came online as a channel of communication, I thought, well, first of all, people will be having a really hard [00:11:00] time communicating effectively over video. That's number one. But number two, if people are on video, we could leverage some of these technologies hypothetically- Mm
to help make the feedback more real time, to help make- Right ... a practice session more on demand, more convenient, more personalized. and then ideally, you know, build out these integration systems or reinforcement systems beyond, you know- Mm-hmm ... the in-person or virtual live training session.
Bart Egnal: Yeah, and I think so true that it was a seismic shift in people's adoption, right?
And also the adoption created new challenges. And, and I think, you know, you alluded to this earlier, that there, you know, both of us have been in the training space for quite some time, and that there, there are always some kind of persistent- issues with training, right? That, that you referenced. One was what do people do after the course, right?
They ha- after the experience. That I think is really challenging to, [00:12:00] to tackle. And then others, you know, I know that we've talked about in, in our prep as well is, you know, the quantification and measurement, right? Yeah. When you look at, when you look at training, like, what is... We've often been asked that question.
You know, what is the improvement? How do you quantify the improvement from training? You know, we kind of inherently understand that there's training, but back to your point, when you do an in-person training in communication, it's difficult. You don't get recordings, you don't get evidence, and, and there's not the technology to measure it.
So, you know, it's really tough to create the, the situation for practice and the measurement and accountability that I think is foundational to skill development. I mean, when you go to the ballet, I'm sure you train for years and years and years, and you have multiple practice sessions. But unless it's a coaching program, which is very expensive, that's tough to do.
So yeah, I definitely see, see that, you know, the pandemic did create a s- a step change in our ability to tackle some of those things.
Rachel Cossar: Yeah. Absolutely.
Bart Egnal: So what was the initial idea for Virtual Sapiens, and how did it come to be?
Rachel Cossar: The, so the initial [00:13:00] idea for Virtual Sapiens was actually focused exclusively on the non-verbal side- Hmm
of communication. Yeah. I, initially I was like, wouldn't it be cool if you were on a Zoom call and you could have, like, a sidekick that was, like, able to analyze your, your body in real time and say like, "Oh," like, "when you're talking you should look into the lens," and, you know, "You haven't used a hand gesture in two minutes- Right
and you're talking," like introduce fine, or like, "Oh, you're slouching," or, "You're out of frame." You know, all of these like- Mm-hmm ... micro behaviors that can really either detract or enhance from your overall virtual presence.
Bart Egnal: Okay.
Rachel Cossar: That was the initial idea. That was the initial product that we built. Ooh. well-
Bart Egnal: And what, what year did you launch that?
Rachel Cossar: That, this was in 2020.
Bart Egnal: 2020. Okay. At
Rachel Cossar: like end of 2020.
Bart Egnal: Mm-hmm ...
Rachel Cossar: was when I founded the company. My co-founder, Neil, came on board in May of 2021.
Bart Egnal:
Rachel Cossar: So we had this idea for this real time in-call coach, and, , we were working towards that. But, you know, , when, when you launch a company, you have to get to a minimum viable product, like as quick- [00:14:00] Yeah.
Mm-hmm ... as possible, and this real time coach was quite technically challenging because we were doing compu- 100% computer vision. So it was taking us a while to develop that, and as we were developing that, we had all these other concepts, one of which was, you know, the very first iteration was, like, people would send in their videos through a, like, video deposit, platform.
And then- Mm-hmm ... I actually used those early videos to develop the, like, alg- like the training algorithm- Hmm ... of these are the behaviors that we're looking for. If we codify them in this way, we can actually train the AI to look for these behaviors in the same way. and so we had this very non-scalable kind of assessment tool- Mm-hmm
that validated a lot of what we were wondering, because the feedback that people re-received even in the early days was, was me giving the feedback. But we presented it as AI giving the feedback. Hmm. And the reason that was important was because we needed to see if people's perceptions around AI feedback, [00:15:00] AI generated feedback, even if it was quality human generated feedback- Mm-hmm
would their perception of, "Oh, this is AI feedback"
Bart Egnal: Would they dis- would they discount it- Exactly ... because it was AI? And what did you learn?
Rachel Cossar: Exactly. Oh, I, I mean, people were like, "Wow," like, "This was so helpful, and these are things-" Right "... that I've, like, heard for years," or like, "Wow, I, I didn't realize I did that," and- Hmm
la, la, la. So, so we were able to very early at least assess that if the quality of the feedback is there-
Bart Egnal: Mm-hmm
Rachel Cossar: People will not immediately discount it just because it's, it was AI generated, right? Okay. And that was, honestly, it sounds super simple, but it was very important because even today-
Bart Egnal: Mm-hmm
Rachel Cossar: people's perceptions will get in the way of actual value on our platform.
Bart Egnal: Right. If they think, oh, you know, it's gonna be slop, I'm just gonna discount it, even if it's real.
Rachel Cossar: Yes, and also expectations, like too, too high expectations- Mm ... actually are more of an issue for us now. Interesting. For example... Yes.
For [00:16:00] example, we may have talked about this, Bart, but people will come to us and say, "You know, we want the video avatars," right?
Bart Egnal:
Rachel Cossar: And then- And, and just
Bart Egnal: a video avatar is?
Rachel Cossar: So if you're having a role play conversation with an AI right now- Mm-hmm ... we're obviously, we're big into role plays and practice conversations.
If you're having a conversation with an AI avatar or AI persona, you can have that be text-based, right? You can be having a text-based conversation. You can have voice-to-voice, so audio. or, or you can have video to video. So here I am as a dynamic human, and now I have an AI avatar that's also a video representation.
Right. And people come to us with these pretty high expectations of what they feel should be possible when it comes to, like, real time video AI generation.
Bart Egnal:
Rachel Cossar: But what they don't maybe realize or they haven't separated is that what they've seen is maybe a demo of an AI generated video- Mm ... that has had multiple regenerations and editing and, like, was not a real time- It's one
Bart Egnal: [00:17:00] final product.
It's not a-
Rachel Cossar: Yeah ...
Bart Egnal: avatar.
Rachel Cossar: It's not... Right. It's not an AI agent that has been instructed to respond spontaneously to- Mm ... whatever the human on the other end is saying, and to do so in a way that's reasonable and acceptable based on our communication norms, right? Right. From a non-verbal perspective. So it's so complex, but, like, people will come to us with these pretty high expectations of what they think should be possible.
Mm. Similarly, people will come to us with an expectation that having a, like, an AI role play conversation will be exactly like what it feels like for, like- Mm ... me to have a conversation with Bart in person, you know?
Bart Egnal: Right.
Rachel Cossar: And I'm like, if that's the expectation- Mm
Bart Egnal: It's not, it's not gonna be our... So, okay, so let's, let's just jump-
to what it ended up as. So-
Rachel Cossar: Right. So, well- So- As you know
Bart Egnal: And it's, it's evolving, I know.
Rachel Cossar: Always, always evolving. So, so we, yeah, we had this sidekick in-call coach, but what we found was that we had this really special fit with [00:18:00] coaching firms. and to, to get to partner with coaching firms to enhance their existing curricul to elevate it, to help them solve that issue that I'd identified and that countless, like almost all, you know, people- Mm-hmm
in the space have identified of practice and reinforcement and integration, and to actually get to be the partner who helps them solve that in a really integrated way, that allowed us to, to do a couple of things. Number one, it, it gave us a very focused expression of our, our tool and platform, which was more of a practice, like- Right
asynchronous practice tool versus this live feedback mechanism.
Bart Egnal: The live coach, right.
Rachel Cossar: So that was one thing. The other thing was that it ... Like I, I still really deeply value the human touch, right? The, the human experience of coaching or the heart of facilitation, right? So much of that is, is like driven by the facilitator's own experiences and bringing them in and then sharing them and then growing together, [00:19:00] right?
And-
Bart Egnal: Mm-hmm ...
Rachel Cossar: and so I did want our platform to introduce an element of scale, but I also wanted it to be amplifying like the, the humans that are behind this training industry- Mm-hmm ... in the, in the first place, right? And, and helping with that human impact. So- Realizing that we had this really nice balance to strike with coaching firms and training firms who have that human-led facilitation component.
Bart Egnal: Right. And I think that's a good segue to what, what it is, and for us at the Humphrey Group, you know, how it's gonna fit into what we're doing. So, you know, people listening, like we, we, what, what we really like about working with you is that we've taken your core tool, and then we've, , trained it in partnership with you on our intellectual capital and our methodology, and so we have, we call it ELI, you know, which is the Expert Learning Insights.
And so the way we envision using it is if you come to a Humphrey Group program, you'll start in ELI, right? And you'll do a baseline test, and you can talk a bit more about [00:20:00] what that is. Then you'll still have the facilitated experience, , but that will draw on that baseline data. And then following the human experience or throughout it, you can then practice and apply and role play, and then you can track your, and quantify your improvement.
So as an individual learner, you can see measurably how you improve, but you can also get the space, the safe space to try out what you learn. And as an organization, we can start to show to our clients, "This is how much your people have improved." I mean, this, we can truly for the first time quantify the impact.
So it's both better improvement, but also better measurement of how that improvement's happening.
Rachel Cossar: Yeah, absolutely.
Bart Egnal: You work with so many organizations, and you see the integration of the human and the AI. So people, for people listening, where do you think human instruction and facilitation really shines, and where does, you know, what you offer through Virtual Sapiens and [00:21:00] partnershi- companies like ours offer?
What's the m- what are the s- the complementary roles?
Rachel Cossar: There's a lot in that question. I'll try to be as succinct as possible. I think these training programs need to be looked at as... I- or I think maybe the one, one of the shortcomings is that they have been isolated into these, like, you have three hours.
Bart Egnal:
Rachel Cossar: Like, have
Bart Egnal: a reality- It used to be two days. Now it's like- Yes ... can you do it in three hours?
Rachel Cossar: Exactly, right? So
Bart Egnal: they're getting shorter. Everything you can get in two days, we'll do it in three hours.
Rachel Cossar: Yes. The, these timeframes of experiential learning are getting shorter. and, and, and then on top of that, the whole experience is kind of isolated to that.
So the first thing that AI does is it allows the organization and the, and the client to, like, co-design a program that has a little bit more longevity, that gives participants an opportunity to actually digest and develop more awareness, and then practice and integrate and, and, and see [00:22:00] measured behavior change and felt behavior change, right, over time.
Now, the, the reason that AI can do this in conjunction with that facilitator-led session is that AI has the added elements of convenience, the ability to scale concurrently, right? So if you have a group of- Mm-hmm ... 50 people or 100 people across three different cohorts, like, everyone can be on this site get, practicing and getting coached at the same time.
Right. It's no problem, right? And, and it's actually important because one could say, "Well, we could just have more time with the participants and the client, and we could add a day, and then we could do all that in person, and wouldn't that be great?" And it's like, well, first of all, it's not realistic. We all know that, right?
Time constraints, resource constraints. but, but second of all, the other fascinating thing that AI provides is a little bit more of a standardized- Mechanism for feedback. Hmm. So you can also have every single person within that 100 cohort or 100-person [00:23:00] cohort be exposed to the same mechanism for feedback, right?
And so everyone kind of gets this objective report baseline- Mm-hmm ... before they've even stepped into the workshop that gives them a, a data point of where they are starting. If the facilitator has access to the reports, it gives the facilitator a really nice snapshot of, like, where- Mm-hmm ... these people stand across behaviors that we're gonna be working on together, right?
and then as the individual enters that, that program, they're already thinking about, "Okay, well, when I did this the first time, I, I felt really nervous. I was scared, and I got feedback on this and that and this," and it gives them this really rich starting point of, like-
Bart Egnal: Right ...
Rachel Cossar: who, who, who they are and the types of strengths they have and the types of or the areas of maybe that are in need of improvement.
They can come to the workshop as so almost, like, warmed up. [00:24:00]
Bart Egnal: Right. Right? And with... And I love what you're saying about it's scalable. Instead of just sending out a pre-read, which, you know, people increasingly don't wanna do- Yeah ... they come... They've actually started to apply the skills, and they've received...
I, I like this concept of a uniform benchmark of how they- Yep ... how they stand, that it's not like five different facilitators who each have- Exactly ... their own biases- Yeah ... and perspectives, but it's one uniform set of standards that they're evaluated against. So the pre- Right ... definitely prepares them to learn and begins to build it more effectively.
And then during, , you're, you're talking about it improves the facilitator's abilities.
Rachel Cossar: Yeah. The other thing that we've heard frequently from people who use our platform that surprised us actually was that, people find it to be a much safer- Hmm Less judgmental space for them to try something. And I don't want that statement to sound like, "Oh, facilitators [00:25:00] are so judgmental," and all that, because most of them aren't.
But we g- like, we as participants have this fear of being judged, right? We, we- Right ... that's w- that's why getting up in front of our peers and, like, trying this presentation for the first time feels so awful 'cause you're so worried that people are gonna be like, "You're garbage."
Bart Egnal: Right.
Rachel Cossar: Even if people are absolutely not gonna do that, we have this fear.
It holds us back. but the AI is this, like, totally non-attached- Right ... entity that you, you also don't really care about. So you're like, "I don't care. Sure, yeah. Oh, you need me to, like, run through a quick introduction or elevator pitch?" Or, "I'm, I'm happy to do that with, like, the AI as, like, a, a first kind of-
Bart Egnal: Mm-hmm
Rachel Cossar: dry run," so to speak. So we've heard from people that they prefer to have their first reps be with the-
Bart Egnal: Right ...
Rachel Cossar: AI in a safer space before they then kind of m- ultimately will have to get up in front of their peers and try the same thing.
Bart Egnal: So it builds, it builds their confidence and [00:26:00] comfort going into the facilitation.
Rachel Cossar: Yeah, because anything repeated feels less foreign.
Bart Egnal: Right.
Rachel Cossar: Right? Whether you've repeated it, I mean, right? Like, we used to say, "Go practice it in front of your bathroom mirror," or, like, run th- there was no accountability-
Bart Egnal: Hmm ...
Rachel Cossar: in that, and that was the problem with that mechanism was that, like, I could come to you and say, "Yeah, I practiced it five times in front of the bathroom mirror," and you would be like, "Well, okay, I-" And you never did.
Either you did or you didn't. I don't know. Like, we're gonna practice it now, and oh, wow, it doesn't look like anything's changed. So I don't... Right? But, like, with the platform, you actually get the accountability piece. And that's the other thing. When you, when it comes to practice specifically, that's never been the case.
Right? You've never been able to have a way to accountably, like, ensure or, or, or even to fold in the practice into the learning journey- Mm-hmm ... so that it feels like such a valuable spend of your time.
Bart Egnal: Right, because then it's, you know, you go back to the office, and then your world goes back to what it was before.
And so- Yeah ... so that's, yeah. So we've talked about the before. During, it makes them more [00:27:00] comfortable having had... And then now you're, you're really getting into the sustainment, the practice, the application. So yeah, just expand on that further. Like, w- let's say someone comes to a course. What might it look like and feel like to be using the tool to apply what they've learned post-fa- you know, facilitation?
Rachel Cossar: So it can look a couple of different ways 'cause we have both, like, a self-serve, a la carte practice portal option, and then we have learning journeys, right? And, and Humphrey Group, I think, deploys both. But, um- The, the self-serve option would be, you know, you, you're like, "Okay, great, I just had this awesome session.
You know, we made accountability notes with peers that we're gonna, like, do at least one practice session a week for the next four weeks. I have it in my calendar," right? Like- Mm-hmm ... you still have to have some of those accountability promises and networks put in so that people continue to return to the platform and practice.
But once those are set, people would then go back to the platform and say, "Okay, I actually wanted to practice that story again. This [00:28:00] presentation is actually coming up tomorrow. I'm gonna run through it three times," right? And then it becomes the, the, the platform that's very flexible. They can use it for whatever they want.
Maybe it's, "Oh, you know what? I have to give some pretty difficult feedback to a colleague. This colleague used to be my peer. Now they're my direct report."
Bart Egnal: "
Rachel Cossar: Let me practice that through with AI," right? And then you can have the... You just prompt the AI verbally, into the persona that you need them to play.
So, so those are, like, the a la carte op- options that can be really nice 'cause they're flexible. If it's more of a learning journey, the learning journey itself would have indicated the steps and stages of the- Right ... experience leading up to that, right? So you would've already gone on and done your baseline assessment.
You would've done the live facilitated workshop. And then you would be like, "Okay, great. Now you're at the reinforcement stage, so we're gonna have you do..." Like, the, the session was on performance reviews or, like, like, manager training 101. Whatever the subject of the workshop was- Mm-hmm ... the [00:29:00] post-workshop platform journey would update to give people concrete exercises and activities to actually apply some of those skills.
Bart Egnal:
Rachel Cossar: Maybe it's a specific framework or a f- a, right, leader script. So the platform would support the individual in integrating those skills.
Bart Egnal: So it really does become f- It's a safe place to practice. It's a regular place to practice. There's an accountability where you're being reminded to do this, and you can build the skill over time in this safe environment by applying what you learned in the program.
Rachel Cossar: Yeah, exactly.
Bart Egnal: And do people use it? I'm curious. You know, you, you put hundreds, thousands of people through this. When people use it, what do... Do they use it, and what do they say about the experience?
Rachel Cossar: Yeah. So the, the biggest indicator of engagement is obviously in the positioning, but it's also in getting, , people on the platform early.
Because I think there's been a lot of Pretty substandard digital learning- Mm-hmm ... out there. [00:30:00] And a lot of people haven't actually even, e-e-even though we feel like AI is apps, so it has saturated everything-
Bart Egnal: Right ... a
Rachel Cossar: lot of people haven't actually experienced AI in this way. Like AI, people haven't experienced being able to interact with AI and get really nuanced feedback from AI yet.
So what they think, again, going back to like expectations here on the opposite end, right? Like their expectations are very low of what they think this platform's gonna do for them. So if you wait until after the program to be like, "Great, and now you can use this as a practice space," the likelihood of them going on is very low.
Bart Egnal: Mm.
Rachel Cossar: However, if you're like This is actually the first step on your journey. It's not pre-work, it's the first step on your journey. We're going to baseline, we're going to do this. Gets them into the platform and gets them familiar with the flow, but it also shows them value up front.
Bart Egnal: And then- Yeah, and then, and then it's linked to the learning itself, as you said- Yeah
which is what we're doing.
Rachel Cossar: Yeah, exactly. And, and if the, if the humans involved are also referencing this platform and also [00:31:00] integrating efforts made on this platform to practice, then it becomes what it is intended to be, which is an integrated part of the- Right ... learning experience versus an ancillary tool that people, you know, may or may not use.
Bart Egnal: Right. Yeah, and I think it very much fits, you know, with our philosophy, which is the human is at the heart of training and at the heart of learning. But we know time, people are under time pressure, and we know that great learning happens through repetition and practice- Mm-hmm ... and internalizing something.
And so we believe what you've created is the perfect fusion with what we do, , and that's why we're so excited about it and, , and, and what's to come. So no, it's, um... Maybe I'll end with one more question. You know, you, you've obviously evolved since you started the company in 2020. You've gone from, you know, the real-time coach to what you're doing now, you know, kind of the AI practice, which was integrated pre and post with us.
What's next? Like, when you look out three years, where will, where will Virtual Sapiens be, and what [00:32:00] will, what will it mean for partnerships like ours?
Rachel Cossar: Yeah. Well, I mean, we've always built hand-in-hand with our coach partners. So I think, you know, the biggest challenges we all face is, you know, how do we build a program that people will keep leveraging as they- Mm-hmm
continue in their careers as professionals, right? And so we're particularly curious, like right, we, we have these learning journeys that we developed around mid, mid last year, and we're adding functionality to them. It's, it's like a very light LMS because the other thing that we're finding is that a lot of our coaching partners in this space, like, don't really have a need for one of the more, like, bloated, for lack of a better term, LMS options out there.
But we still need something more structured that contains the experience. so how do we, you know, how do we build that in a way that feels as light and nimble as, as our coach partners need it to be, and as, like, easy and delightful for the participants themselves? I think [00:33:00] there's a lot more we could do I don't wanna say like gamification because that feels so silly, but incentivizing people.
Bart Egnal: Right. So Rachel, I really appreciate you coming on the pod, but most- mostly I appreciate the work that you did to build Virtual Sapiens and, and what it's meant for our Eli integration and, and what's coming. So for, for people listening who, you know, , obviously if you're gonna take a program with the Humphrey Group, you're gonna experience this, but if someone is not, you know, scheduled to take a program and they wanna know more, they wanna pilot this technology, what can you offer?
Where can they go?
Rachel Cossar: Absolutely. So we do have a free trial that's available to anyone to try. so if you go to virtualsapiens.co, there's call to actions all over the place saying, "Try it for free." so you can, you know, without having to even put down a credit card, you can, you can try a role play or a practice mirror or, something like that and just get a feel for what it is like to have that AI be your practice and conversation partner.
[00:34:00] That's the easiest way, certainly from our end, to experience a little bit of what we've been discussing.
Bart Egnal: That's great. Thanks so much for coming on the podcast. Thanks for what you do, and, , look forward to the next, , evolution of Eli.
Rachel Cossar: Thanks so much. Well, thanks for trusting us at Virtual Sapiens.
Bart Egnal: I hope you enjoyed that episode of the Inspire Podcast and the conversation that I had, , with our guest. And hopefully you left with some really practical, tangible tools and tips that you can use to be more consistently inspirational. If you're enjoying the pod, I'll ask you a favor. Please rate and review it.
I love the comments, appreciate the reviews, and the visibility allows others to discover the pod. It's really how word of mouth has spread the Inspire Podcast to so many listeners and helped us keep making this great content. Stay tuned. We'll be back in two weeks with another inspiring [00:35:00] conversation.
Thanks so much for listening. Go forth and inspire