Client story · Executive coaching
In twelve weeks, Sonic’s team was choosing its own AI tools and putting them to work.
Executive coaching · Calgary · 12 weeks
Sonic Coaching Partners
Emails sitting in Oliver’s inbox
Before
150+
Never under 150
After
83
Mid-afternoon on a day of back-to-back meetings, before he’d opened it
~1 hour
saved a week, by SaneBox’s weekly report
Source: Oliver’s own inbox count, and the weekly time-saved report from his email tool (SaneBox).
At a glance
- Who
- Sonic Coaching Partners, an executive and business coaching firm in Calgary. Founder Oliver Baezner is also a certified Chair with MacKay CEO Forums.
- Duration
- 12 weeks
- The win they wanted
- Time back
- Result
- Oliver’s inbox used to sit above 150 emails. Now it gets sorted for him, and his email tool reports about an hour saved a week. His AI Champion is rolling the same setup onto her own computer.
- Measured by
- Oliver’s own inbox count and the weekly time-saved report from his email tool (SaneBox)
Where they started
Oliver adopts early. He put his name down for Microsoft Copilot with his IT provider before it was available to firms his size, and he carries several AI apps on his phone. What he didn’t have was a way to decide what to do with them, or a way to explain to his corporate clients where they stood.
“I need a framework, and I need a way to be able to also explain to my clients… where are you at within the AI journey.”
He also wanted the whole team in it with him, starting with Melissa Leech, his Executive Assistant, and Dennis, his business development manager in Edmonton. Both were coming to AI fresh, which made the program a chance to build the habits properly from day one. For a firm that advises corporations on how to lead, it mattered that everyone could speak to AI from experience.
“If we’re not using it, how can we tell our clients to use it exactly?”
Sonic Coaching Partners
What we did together
Oliver sponsored the program and Melissa took the role of AI Champion (the person inside the company who keeps AI work moving after we leave).
Asked the team where it hurts: a list of problems worth solving with AI, including the ones Oliver was dealing with himself.
An internal survey of Sonic’s team.
What problems are we trying to solve? And for me, that was like, that was magic.
Piloted on real work: a tool proven on his own inbox before he paid for it.
Melissa researched email tools and picked SaneBox for its reviews and its fit with Microsoft. Oliver ran it for most of the program.
Wrote AI operating principles: guardrails Oliver checks every new project against.
A short document of rules for how Sonic uses AI, built during the program alongside other firms’ versions.
Heard from specialists: guest sessions, including one on governance.
I thought that was going to be… my least favorite. But she had some really good stuff.
One workflow, before and after
| Before | After | |
|---|---|---|
| The work | Everything lands in one inbox, including every email he’s copied on. Anything below the first screen falls out of sight. | SaneBox sorts mail into folders. Copies go to their own folder. Oliver works through the rest in quick passes. |
| Volume | Never under 150 | 83 mid-afternoon on a day of back-to-back meetings, before he’d opened it |
| What AI does | Nothing | Sorts and files incoming mail by priority |
| What Oliver still owns | Everything | What matters, what gets answered, and what stays put. He kept one email in his inbox on purpose because he didn’t want AI to move it. |
What changed
The inbox is the visible result. SaneBox’s weekly report puts the saving at about an hour a week. Oliver thinks that’s low: I think it’s closer to 100 or more
hours a year.
The bigger change was in the team. Melissa embraced it quickly and has grown into the firm’s go-to person on AI. Sometimes she gets it more than I get it.
Dennis brings three decades of sales experience, and he jumped in with both feet. He set up his account right away and is now using AI to understand a prospect’s challenges before he reaches out. He was on fire, like he got so excited by it.
Oliver and Melissa are working alongside him so the time he puts in pays off.
Not every test worked. Sonic tried Copilot on one of its problems and it fell short. Didn’t work. Let’s go find another one, right?
Copilot stayed on as a meeting transcription tool. It won’t be rolled out to everyone.
What they kept
- Melissa as AI Champion. She researched and chose the email tool, and is now setting it up for herself
- AI operating principles the team checks each new project against.
We’ve got our guardrails in place to do what we need to do.
- A way to judge the next problem.
The framework allows us to evaluate the next piece and the next piece.
Next on the list: finding better marketing leads. - Tools in daily use: SaneBox for email, Recall for summarizing videos and newsletters, ChatGPT for presentations and research
Don’t walk, run to take the program, because… you will get your time back in spades.”
Next step
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