Run a coaching program your HR team can actually manage
A global standards and certification body replaced an ad-hoc coaching process with a structured Airtable workflow that handles intake, triage, and matching across 32 coaches and 39 active relationships.
What they needed
The HR and Learning & Development team ran an internal coaching program that relied on informal processes and Workday, a system that lacks purpose-built coaching features. Requests arrived without a consistent intake path, acknowledgements were sent manually, and there was no single place to see coach availability alongside incoming demand.
As the program grew, the absence of a consolidated view made it harder to triage requests promptly and match employees to coaches without delays. The team needed a lightweight solution that could handle the full intake-to-match lifecycle without adding administrative overhead.
What they built
The team built an Airtable-based coaching program hub that connects an intranet intake form to a triage view, a coach directory, and linked relationship records. When an employee submits a coaching request, it lands in Airtable with no manual re-keying required.
HR reviewers triage requests in a single queue, compare coach profiles, and create linked coaching relationship records that join the employee request to the matched coach. The result is a complete, queryable record of every active engagement across all 32 coaches.
The outcome
Since deployment, the organization has recorded a 25% increase in coaching relationships, a figure tracked directly in the account's solution records. The team now manages 39 active coaching relationships across 32 coaches from one hub.
The process eliminated re-keying between intake and relationship records and gave the team an always-current view of program volume. HR and Learning & Development report a noticeably lighter administrative load compared to the previous approach.
Inside the solution
Internal Coaching Program Management
People & Talent Operations
Learning & Development
- Intranet form intake
- Request triage
- Coach matching
- Record linking
- Workday lacks suitable coaching features
- Missing automated acknowledgements for coaching requests
- No consolidated view of coaches, requests, and active relationships
- Manual matching caused delays and inconsistent follow-up
- 25% increase in coaching relationships recorded since deployment
- Lightweight process that fits HR team bandwidth
- 32 coaches and 39 active relationships tracked in one hub
- Zero re-keying between intake and relationship record
- HR
- Learning & Development
- Workday
Internal Coaching Program Management
Run an internal coaching program end to end: capture requests from an intranet form, triage them in a single queue, compare coach profiles and availability, and create linked coaching relationship records with no re-keying. Automations send the acknowledgement, spin up the relationship record the moment a request is matched, and email a weekly triage digest, while AI fields summarise each request, coach profile and engagement for reviewers.
From intake to active coaching relationship in four steps
Capture requests through intranet form intake
Triage and prioritize incoming requests
Match employees to the right coach
Track active relationships through record linking
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
Workday is the system of record for HR data but lacks purpose-built features for coaching intake, triage, and matching. Airtable fills that gap with a lightweight workflow that sits alongside Workday rather than replacing it, pulling in relevant employee data while handling the program logic that Workday cannot.
Employees submit coaching requests through an intranet form that feeds directly into an Airtable base. The submission creates a new record in the intake view with no manual re-keying, so the HR team sees requests in real time and can begin triage immediately.
After triage, reviewers open the coach directory view alongside the incoming request. They compare coach availability, areas of focus, and current relationship count, then create a linked coaching relationship record that connects the employee request to the selected coach and logs the start of the engagement.
Yes. The record-linking model means you can add coaches, extend intake fields, or introduce additional triage criteria without restructuring the base. The program currently tracks 32 coaches and 39 active relationships, and the same data model supports a larger roster without architectural changes.
Since the Airtable workflow went live, the number of active coaching relationships increased by 25% compared to the prior period. This figure is recorded in the account's solution records. The team attributes it to faster triage, clearer coach availability data, and a lower administrative burden on the HR team handling matching.