Ethical and Empowering AI use in Career Development Practice: Maintaining Judgment and Client Agency

AI is increasingly shaping the career information, advice and guidance that our career clients encounter - from students to executive professionals. As career development practitioners, this 'shaping' is taking place as part of our clients' systems of influence before guidance interactions. The scope of the 'personalised' information and computational abilities of generative AI in particular means that, compared with other factors (e.g. peers, parents, community), it has a different potential influence on career decision making. This influence operates both at an individual level (e.g. self efficacy, vocational identity formation and personal narratives, perceived agency) and at a broader systemic or macro level (e.g. opportunity awareness, horizons for action, and exposure to labour market narratives).

This Digital Byte draws on experience from two opposite sides of the globe. It will look at case study research of AI principles in career education and guidance born from experience in UK universities, and compare this with the latest professional standards used in Australia (CICA 2026), where digital literacy and ethical AI use are extensively and explicitly embedded. Applying these principles to real career‑development scenarios, the session explores how practitioners can use generative AI responsibly and critically in guidance conversations, while maintaining trust, transparency, and a balanced approach that supports clients in making informed career decisions.

Participants will gain practical insight into:

•    Where AI challenges and reshapes the practitioner-client relationship
•    Where professional judgment must sit alongside AI generated insight
•    How to support clients to evaluate and question AI influenced career advice
•    Aligning everyday practice with research and international perspectives on ethical digital and AI use

This session is designed to support practitioners to move beyond awareness into more confident, ethical and client centred usage of generative AI, translating a body of principles to more tangible, everyday career development practice.

Biography

Barnaby Mollett is an experienced career coach, professional skills trainer and educational leader. He's worked at the London School of Economics (LSE), University College London (UCL), and Imperial College London, as well as in further education, focusing on guidance and career education. At the LSE, he developed a Framework for AI usage in Career Education (published as an AdvanceHE case study), which particularly focuses on the ethical balance of drawing on AI as career guidance practitioners, and built this out further into practical use cases and training during his time at LSE. London born-and-bred, he currently works as a Senior Consultant leading on career development and employability at Intalo Group in Melbourne, Australia.

This session supports the following CPD competencies:

•    Career Development Practice
•    Professional Practice, CPD and Research