AI Tool of the Week: How HowNow’s Guru turns workplace learning into a personalised AI coaching experience

Learning at work is evolving. As roles become more complex and skills gaps widen, organisations need smarter ways to develop their people.

The “one-size-fits-all” training methods no longer cut it.

Employees require guidance that is relevant to their current situation, aligns with their learning styles, and provides information seamlessly within their workflow.

Meet HowNow, an AI-powered learning and skills platform that maps skills requirements to contextualised learning in the flow of work.

In this edition of the AI tool of the Week, let’s explore HowNow Guru — an AI agent that teaches, challenges, and adapts to the individual learner’s capabilities and skills gaps.

HowNow: AI-powered learning/skill platform

Led by Nelson Sivalingam, HowNow is the AI-powered learning and skills platform that maps skills requirements to contextualised learning in the flow of work.

The platform’s technology helps organisations to create and develop the right skills, at the right time, bridging the gap between L&D and measurable business impact.

The AI-powered new-age “Guru”

Recently, the company launched HowNow Guru, an AI learning agent.

HowNow Guru acts as an always-on coach that understands the learner, adapts to their skill level, and delivers feedback and support based on how they practise, what they need to improve on, and the business context they work in.

Employees can use Guru to practice real-world scenarios through AI-generated role-plays, complete knowledge checks, and quizzes designed for their skill level.

They can also explore more complex topics through linked insights and track their progress with ongoing skill reviews.

Each interaction adjusts to their learning style, what they know, and what they need to improve, turning conversations into effective learning experiences.

Guru is also part of the HowNow platform, which helps it use the organization’s resources, the learner’s history, and real-time performance data to provide relevant support without adding extra work for L&D teams.

Nelson Sivalingam, Co-Founder and CEO at HowNow, says, “In Guru, we’ve essentially created a world-class teacher that not only knows everything the organisation knows, but which is also equipped with the frameworks it needs to coach people in the best way possible. It can teach, challenge, quiz, provide feedback and guidance – and because Guru is embedded directly into the HowNow platform, it also understands the learner’s unique aptitude and ability, which informs highly bespoke learning and effective behaviour change.”

Collaboration with third-party sources

According to the UK company, customers can choose to power Guru using their learning content or connect it with third-party sources, including HowNow partners –Assemble You and getAbstract.

getAbstract – the world’s largest library of verified expert knowledge – enables Guru to use insights from trusted thought leaders and apply them in coaching conversations, turning abstract ideas into actionable guidance.

Thomas Bergen, Co-Founder and CEO at getAbstract says, “The quality of AI agents depends profoundly on the quality of the underlying knowledge base. With getAbstract as its verified expert knowledge partner HowNow has chosen the best database for AI coaches in the market.”