The Explosion of Coaching in Digital Health: Four Industry Experts on Scaling a Best-in-Class Health Coaching Experience

Pillar shares insights from a panel of coaches at the forefront of shaping how consumers access personalized health guidance.

Coaching has become a best practice for innovative care models, with the list of companies offering a coach in the loop growing every quarter. The demand is here - a Google search for “health coach jobs” returns over 11,000 results – and has spread across concierge care, digital health, and healthcare itself. The role of a health coach in these contexts spans the gamut whether it’s enabling treatment plan adherence in partnership with clinicians to ensuring consistent engagement with a digital program. That said, a coach’s core value lies in their training as behavior change experts.

From the $3 billion merger between Ginger and Headspace to the introduction of a coaching offering at luxury wellness brands like Canyon Ranch and The Well, certified coaches are becoming integral to the health & wellness ecosystem - supporting clients in bridging the gap between where they are and where they want to be.?

Several key factors have propelled health coaches to the forefront:

• Creation of standards for the coaching field and the National Board Credential (NBC-HWC) in 2017 by the National Board of Health & Wellness Coaching, a non-profit affiliate of the National Board of Medical Examiners.?
• The AMA’s approval of CPT III codes (effective as of 2020) for Health and Well-Being Coaching delivered by National Board Certified Health Coaches, paving the way for reimbursable health coaching.
• A growing body of evidence demonstrates the ROI of health coaching. Pillar is wrapping up an evaluation and review of over 120 research studies demonstrating the clinical efficacy of health coaching - we plan to publicly release that report in the coming months!

Today as the Head of Health Coaching and founding team member at Pillar, I regularly connect with industry leaders across digital health and healthcare who have a front-row seat to the productization of coaching. From those conversations, it’s clear the future of coaching will be enabled by digital-first technology that arms coaches with the data, insights, and tools to provide personalized care across a large client panel.

As a National Board Certified Coach myself, I’ve witnessed first-hand the distinction between coaching in private practice versus as part of a broader digital health program. The crux of the delta lies in the reality that individuals have unique needs in the style of coaching they prefer (client-led or coach-directed) and in the delivery (SMS, video, frequency). So how does this scale??

In this series, I’ve interviewed industry-leading coaches at the forefront of digital health coaching. Like me, each of these contributors has experience directly coaching clients and has since then, translated those best practices into scaling effective coaching programs that work - both for the coaches and their clients.

We’ll be releasing Part One: Meet the Experts next with insights from venture-backed coach innovators.?

Stay tuned!

Kasia Smith, NBC-HWC, Head of Health Coaching at Pillar

About Kasia: Kasia is a National Board Certified Health & Wellness Coach and brings a decade of experience in clinical neuropsychology research, insurance and health coaching. At Pillar, Kasia leads the expansion and management of the coach community and broader provider network. For coaches, click here to join our network.

About Pillar: Pillar powers board-approved health coaching, providing companies with the white-labeled workforce and technology to launch or scale a coaching program in-house with measurable ROI. We’re female-founded and backed by top-tier investors including Y Combinator, Streamlined Ventures, as well as industry-leading founders and operators in the healthcare ecosystem.?For companies interested in launching and scaling coaching in-house, email [email protected].