Coaching, compliance, and skill development at scale
To address these challenges, Unboxed built the Skill Building Platform on Microsoft Azure. The platform combines learning, practice, and coaching into a single ecosystem that’s designed to help employees build skills continuously. AI-powered, scenario-based roleplaying opportunities provide trainees with a wealth of experience before they ever dive into live interactions.
“Skill development isn’t new, but traditional approaches haven’t kept pace with the speed of business, constant reorganizations, and ongoing economic pressures,” said Dave Romero, founder and president of Unboxed.
“One-on-one practice and coaching are difficult to scale, and canned simulations fail to prepare teams for real-world complexity. Our AI-driven coaching and roleplay capabilities, powered by Microsoft, provide the scalable force multiplier global teams need to enhance human-to-human interactions and accurately measure skill readiness.”
For regulated industries, Unboxed developed FactChecker™ AI, which validates messaging against approved content. This reinforces compliance during training and reduces risk in high-stakes conversations.
At the heart of the solution is Mentor, an AI roleplay tool that simulates realistic conversations and provides adaptive feedback. With the tool, employees can practice robust scenarios multiple times and receive targeted coaching for improvement.
Powered by the Microsoft AI suite, Mentor has been deployed by enterprise organizations as a powerful and efficient replacement or supplement for traditional training events. According to the team, the tool has generated rapid ROI and made an immediate impact on the enterprises that used it.
“Instead of spending a full day doing one roleplay in front of a manager, learners can now practice several times, get feedback, and send their best version for review,” said Nittolo. “We’ve seen people do [up to] nine roleplays in a 30-minute session. That’s a huge increase in practice time.” According to Nittolo, Mentor has brought new employees up to full-skill strength in just one week, as opposed to more traditional leveling-up that can take up to six weeks.
For a company like Axalta, which specializes in high-precision industrial and automotive coatings and does business around the world, the demand for training opportunities was significant. In a 2021 engagement survey, nearly 13,000 Axalta employees across 140 countries were eager for tools and resources to support their growth and development—which is exactly what Unboxed delivered.
“The Unboxed platform has been instrumental in helping us transform learning at Axalta,” said Chris Leady, Director of Global Talent Management at Axalta. “It enabled us to launch and scale training programs globally with speed and consistency, while offering over 4,000 learning modules across a wide range of topics—from manager development and professional growth to curated learning journeys, podcasts, and more.”
Another key component of the Unboxed Skill Building Platform is Coach, which uses Azure AI to automate coaching reports. Unboxed developed this component of the solution after a client shared that managers weren’t coaching consistently. The team collaborated with the client to fine-tune the solution and develop a consistent coaching framework.
“It takes a lot of time to really think through, ‘How do I want to write this, how do I want to say something,’ making sure you write it in the right format and structure and making sure you’re giving actionable feedback,“ said Nittolo. “There was a 40% increase in coaching efficiency because the managers now had an AI tool to help them write the feedback.”
All tools are hosted on Microsoft Azure, leveraging its trusted stack for enterprise-grade security, privacy, and compliance. The scalability of Azure allows Unboxed to support global deployments, while its AI capabilities enable rapid iteration and innovation. “Microsoft’s trusted AI tech stack was critical to our success. Not only does it enable us to be compliant with AI governance committees in regulated industries like Life Sciences, but it also enables us to live up to the high expectations of global companies,” said Romero.