Trust window navigation
Every new job, promotion, new manager, return from leave, layoff, new team, board seat, merger opens a trust window.
It's when impressions form, alliances are read, and the informal verdict on someone's potential is quietly written. The Impression Advantage Coach is AI coaching that guides your people through it.
Skills are built over years. Reputations are decided in weeks.
Over 1 in 3
Over one-third of newly hired employees quit within their first year.1
½ to 2×
an employee's annual salary: what it can cost to replace one person, by Gallup's own conservative estimate.2
66%
of managers and executives say most recent hires were not fully prepared, and experience was the most common failing.3
68%
of executive transitions founder on issues related to politics, culture and people.4
Most of that cost lands before a first annual review, in the trust window formal onboarding doesn't cover.
Estimate what first-year exits cost youThe framework
Eight trust windows. The moments that decide careers.
The Impression Advantage Coach is built on the eight trust windows: bounded, high-stakes periods when trust is formed or re-formed at work.
- 01
New Job
01New Job
Credibility starts from zero, and everyone forms a first impression at once.
Within 90 days at a new company. Peak intensity in weeks 1 to 4.
- 02
Promotion or New Internal Role
02Promotion or New Internal Role
A past reputation helps, but credibility in the new role has to be earned again.
Within 90 days in the new role. Heightened scrutiny in weeks 2 to 8.
- 03
New Manager
03New Manager
The job is the same. The person judging it is new.
Within 90 days under new management. Peak intensity in the first four weeks.
- 04
Return from Leave
04Return from Leave
The organization kept moving. Presence has to be rebuilt.
Within 90 days of returning. Peak intensity in weeks 1 to 3.
- 05
Layoff Aftermath
05Layoff Aftermath
Trust in the organization is shaken just as the pressure to show value rises.
Within 90 days after a layoff. Peak intensity in weeks 1 to 4.
- 06
Taking Over a Team
06Taking Over a Team
Judged from two directions at once: by the team, and by peers and leaders.
Within 90 days as the team's new manager. Peak intensity in weeks 2 to 8.
- 07
High-Stakes Project, Board or Advisory Role
07High-Stakes Project, Board or Advisory Role
A new group of senior stakeholders decides quickly how much weight a voice carries.
Within 90 days of the engagement. Peak intensity in weeks 1 to 4.
- 08
Transformational Moments
08Transformational Moments
M&A, restructuring and succession reset trust for everyone, and alliances are rewritten.
Within 90 days of the announcement. Peak intensity in the first 60 days.
How it works
AI coaching, timed to the moments that matter.
Coaching begins when a trust window opens and guides each person through the 90 days that decide it. Everyone in a trust window gets it, with no sessions to schedule and no coaches to add.
An AI coach for every person in a trust window
Private, on their own time, at the right moment, and calibrated to their level.
A companion for their manager
Short, timely prompts that help managers support the transition.
Insight for People & Talent leaders
See where trust windows are going well across groups of 10 or more. Never individuals.
See the coach
It listens first, then tells the truth.
One prompt at a time, in plain language, tied to what the person just said.
Coach
Good to know. Hybrid changes how your manager reads you, because they are forming their view from what they see on your on-site days and what they hear from peers on the days you are remote. … What have you been most focused on demonstrating to your manager so far, now that you are five days in?
New hire
I've been focused on building relationships with my peers, understanding the organizational culture, and … how my leader works and how they like to receive information.
Coach
That is a reasonable list, and the part about learning how your leader likes to receive information is smart. Most people skip it. Here is my honest read, though. Everything you named is about taking in. Peers, culture, your leader's preferences. That is the right instinct in week one, but it is not yet what your manager is weighing. A lot of Entry Level professionals miss this. Your manager is not primarily evaluating your technical skills right now. They already saw that in the hiring process. So when your manager thinks about you at the end of a day on-site, or after hearing something from a peer on a remote day, what do you think the question in their head is?
Their manager gets a companion too. See what it says when a manager is ready to call it a bad hire →
What a pilot measures
Outcomes you can take to your leadership team.
First-year retention
Retention of the pilot group, compared with your own baseline.
Coaching engagement
How many people in a trust window use their coach, and how often.
Manager participation
How many managers act on their companion prompts.
Every pilot ends with an outcomes report.
Design partner program
Three design partner places.
Pilots launch April 15 to May 15, 2027. Design partners shape which trust windows come next, work directly with the founder, and lock in design partner pricing for years two and three.
Three disciplines
Every trust window is navigated the same way.
Clarity
Understanding what success looks like from the perspective of the people evaluating you, not from your own perspective.
Communication
Making your thinking, priorities, and progress visible to the right stakeholders in the right way at the right time.
Consistency
Aligning what you say, what you do, and how you show up across days, meetings, and interactions so that the signal about who you are becomes stable and reliable in the minds of others.
Built by Isaac Adesugba: 20 years in People & Talent with global organizations headquartered in the US, UK, Japan and France, a Cornell-trained People leader, and author of The Ultimate Impression.
Why he built itPrivate by architecture
What an employee shares with their coach stays theirs. Not their manager's, not their employer's: enforced by the platform's database itself.
How we protect privacy