Scenario 4 | Low Tech, High Collaboration: Local Roots, Human Touch
This scenario explores how coaching could evolve by rejecting an over-reliance on technology to intentionally prioritize human connection. By 2036, coaching has transformed into a hyper-localized, culturally adaptive practice, shaped by three intersecting drivers: Technological Acceleration, Economic Disruptions and Evolving Work, and Globalization and Cultural Intelligence.Key insights reveal that one-third of the global population lacks internet access, AI data centers contribute to unsustainable energy consumption, and Indigenous communities successfully petition for tech-free zones to preserve traditional lifestyles. The 2025 ICF Global Coaching Study highlights the persistence of in-person coaching in regions with low digital penetration, underscoring that face-to-face and community-based practices remain vital components of coaching ecosystems.
Picture This:
In response to mounting tech fatigue, cybersecurity risks, and environmental concerns, coaching practitioners adapt and teach coaching principles to better serve their local communities through an emerging approach called community-based coaching. These coaches leverage cultural expertise to design hyper-local solutions that reflect the unique needs and values of their clients. Economic disruption and workforce shifts have driven schools, businesses, and nonprofits to invest in collaborative, low-tech spaces that foster trust, resilience, and shared learning. Human connection is preferred over tech-saturated environments, while community-driven coaching structures gain traction globally.
How This Future Unfolds Across Markets
While technology takes a back seat and hyper-local solutions prevail in this future scenario, the coaching experience varies by region:
Established Markets:
e.g., North America, Europe
- Low-tech coaching emphasizes restoring human connection and fostering collaboration in tech-fatigued environments.
Emerging Markets:
e.g., Southeast Asia, Africa, Latin America
- Community-based coaching promotes non-hierarchical decision-making and empowers local development to value traditional lifestyles over a digitally saturated world.
The following drivers and signals of change explore a future centered on culturally sensitive human connection and collaboration.
Technological advancement has unintentional consequences around the globe.
- Signal: In-person coaching will remain relevant for those who reject technology, favoring human connection while embracing creative boredom through collaborative development.
- Signal: Approximately one-third of the global population lacks internet access. The Digital Divide continues to challenge low-income and rural communities worldwide, making digital coaching services inaccessible.
The adoption of generative AI transforms the workplace but strains global energy resources.
- Signal: From 2020 to 2030, AI data centers will produce an estimated 2.5 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, limiting energy availability in emerging markets and increasing reliance on low-tech, or in-person, community-driven coaching models.
- Signal: To address loneliness and foster engagement, organizations implement technology-free spaces that focus on in-person, collaborative development.
Tech rejectionism emerges as a global cultural movement resisting overdependence on technology.
- Signal: The Baduy Dalam, an Indigenous community in Indonesia, successfully petitioned the government to block internet access to preserve traditional ways of life.
- Signal: A rise in intentional low-tech communities reflects concerns about technological overdependence and its environmental impact.
In a future where AI dominates global systems, coaching grounded in community connection and analog interaction thrives.
Established Markets:
- AI-Facilitated Culture Coaching: AI facilitates group coaching with instant translation and note-taking, enhancing human connection.
- Global Learning Networks: Coaches leverage free online platforms to exchange insights from community-based coaching experiences, supporting collaborative professional development.
- Digital Sponsorship Ecosystems: Coaching associations, nonprofits, and practitioners collaborate to fund community coaching initiatives for underrepresented communities.
Emerging Markets:
- Community-Based Coaching Models: Coaches combine family, cultural, and spiritual values with coaching methods for a localized approach.
- Knowledge Sharing Networks: Non-traditional channels, such as asynchronous messaging platforms and regional coach rotations, enable resource sharing.
- Return-to-Community Sponsorships: Rural, underrepresented, and Indigenous communities collectively sponsor coach training and benefit from culturally adapted practices.
The Future Coaching Industry’s Role
Organizations like ICF, coaching bodies, NGOs, charitable foundations, and academic institutions collaborate to co-develop and fund community-based coaching pathways. These models generate insights that enrich global coaching science.
Established Markets:
- Establish global ethics guidelines to ensure culturally adaptive coaching models align with professional standards.
Emerging Markets:
- Promote standards and funding models that center community needs, traditions, and context-specific approaches.
Global Facilitation:
- Partner with charitable foundations and coaching associations to expand access, train local leaders, and explore community coaching as a form of citizen science.
Future Client Personas: Coaching in 2036
Client expectations shift toward deeper relational trust and culturally attuned support systems.
Established Market Clients:
- Seek human connection and digital well-being coaching for relief from tech fatigue, especially among leaders, parents, and educators.
- Engage coaching as a tool to navigate hyper-connectivity’s impact on human relationships, health, attention, and climate.
- Prefer collaborative, in-person engagements that foster curiosity, dialogue, and connection.
- Balance advanced technology as a supplementary tool for meaningful human interaction.
Emerging Market Clients:
- Value coaching that emphasizes collective well-being and preserves local traditions while adapting to global influences.
- Prefer building relationships through in-person community engagement to promote collective well-being and shared decision-making, facilitated by community-based coaching.
- Address the challenges to reliable technology by prioritizing in-person and culturally adaptive coaching solutions.
Future Coach Personas: Coaching in 2036
Coaches in 2036 adapt to complex socio-cultural environments while championing relational, human-first models.
Established Market Coaches:
- Promote in-person client engagement, strategically leveraging low-tech solutions for communication and professional knowledge sharing.
- Support corporate clients with digital detox coaching and leadership resilience initiatives.
- Facilitate collective decision-making and shared learning within diverse stakeholder groups.
- Participate in knowledge-sharing networks, contributing to professional growth through volunteering and collaboration.
Emerging Market Coaches:
- Lead community-led initiatives by integrating coaching into local sustainability and adaptation efforts.
- Champion hyper-localized approaches that prioritize cultural authenticity, ancestral background dynamics, well-being, and connection to nature.
- Adapt to challenges related to technology access, political instability, and resource scarcity.
This low-tech, high-collaboration future scenario surfaces some tensions:
- Coaching Models and Cultural Values: How can coaching models evolve to reflect diverse cultural and economic contexts?
- Coaching Science and Community Innovation: How can the profession promote citizen science without compromising standards?
- Ethics and Standards: What unique coaching competencies are needed for community-based coaching?
- Cost Sharing and Inclusion: What alternative funding and partnership models can sustain community coaching in underserved areas?
As you consider this future, ask yourself:
- What excites or concerns you about this vision?
- How might your role evolve in a world like this?
- What action could you take now to prepare?