You ask Michelle to do something — reschedule a session, update a program, send a message — and instead of just doing it, she pauses and asks you to confirm. That's not a bug. It's Michelle's write-action confirmation system, and understanding how it works will save you time and prevent accidental changes you didn't mean to make.
This article explains exactly how Michelle handles confirmations for write actions: why she asks, when she skips the prompt, how to approve or cancel, and how to get the most out of her as a hands-free co-pilot inside your Coachful dashboard.
TL;DR
- Michelle always confirms before executing any action that creates, updates, or deletes data (write actions).
- Read-only requests (lookups, summaries, reports) require no confirmation.
- You approve a write action by replying Yes, Confirm, or similar — or cancel it with No, Cancel, or Stop.
- Confirmations include a plain-English summary of exactly what will change, so you always know what you're approving.
- You can chain multiple actions in one prompt; Michelle will list them all before executing any.
What counts as a write action?
Michelle draws a clear line between reading data and changing it. Read actions — pulling up a client's progress, summarising a program's schedule, listing upcoming bookings — happen instantly with no gate. Write actions are anything that modifies your workspace, and those always require your explicit go-ahead.
Here are the most common write actions Michelle can perform:
- Programs: creating a new program, adding or editing weeks/days/tasks, publishing or archiving a program, assigning a client to a program.
- Squads: creating a cohort or community squad, updating squad settings, posting an announcement to a squad.
- Bookings & scheduling: blocking time on your calendar, creating a session type, cancelling or rescheduling a booked session.
- Clients & accounts: updating a client's profile fields, changing a client's role or org membership, sending an invite.
- Offers & billing: creating or editing a Stripe-connected offer, applying a coupon, adjusting a payment plan.
- Content & website: publishing a blog post, updating a landing page, editing a link-in-bio.
- Messaging: sending a chat message on your behalf inside Stream Chat.
If you're ever unsure whether a request will trigger a confirmation, just ask Michelle first: "What would you do if I asked you to archive Program X?" She'll describe the action before committing to anything.
How the confirmation flow works, step by step
When you send Michelle a prompt that involves a write action, she follows a consistent four-step flow every time:
- Intent detection. Michelle parses your message and identifies one or more write actions embedded in your request. She maps each action to the specific platform operation it corresponds to (e.g., "update the Week 3 task" → edit task record in program ID #XYZ).
- Plain-English summary. Before doing anything, Michelle replies with a clear, human-readable description of what she's about to do. Example: "I'll rename the task 'Day 1 Check-In' to 'Morning Reflection' inside Week 1 of your 12-Week Mindset Reset program. This affects 14 active clients enrolled in this program."
- Explicit approval prompt. She ends her summary with a direct question — "Shall I go ahead?" or "Ready to confirm?" — so you know a response is required.
- Execution or cancellation. Reply with a confirmation word and Michelle executes immediately. Reply with a cancellation word (or just ignore the thread) and nothing changes.
The entire exchange typically takes under 30 seconds. For simple single-step actions, the confirmation message is usually one or two sentences. For complex multi-step requests, Michelle uses a numbered list so you can scan each change at a glance.
Confirming and cancelling: exact words that work
Michelle is designed to understand natural language, so you don't need a magic phrase. That said, here are the words she reliably recognises:
To approve
- Yes / Yep / Yeah
- Confirm / Confirmed
- Go ahead / Do it / Proceed
- Looks good / That's right / Correct
To cancel
- No / Nope
- Cancel / Stop / Abort
- Don't do that / Never mind / Skip it
To modify before confirming
You can also correct Michelle mid-confirmation. If her summary isn't quite right, just say what needs to change — "Actually, rename it 'Evening Reflection', not 'Morning Reflection'" — and she'll update her proposed action and re-confirm before executing. You never have to start the conversation over.
Pro tip: When you want Michelle to execute immediately without a round-trip confirmation, phrase your request in the most unambiguous way possible and include all required details upfront. The clearer your prompt, the faster the flow — but the confirmation gate will still appear for safety.
Chained and multi-step actions
One of Michelle's most powerful features is handling complex, multi-part requests in a single prompt. Say you type: "Create a new 8-week strength coaching program, add three tasks per week, and assign it to my Squad named 'January Cohort'."
Michelle won't execute each step silently one by one. Instead, she'll present a consolidated confirmation that lists every action she's about to take:
- Create a new program titled "8-Week Strength Coaching" with 8 weeks.
- Add 3 tasks to each of the 8 weeks (24 tasks total).
- Link the program to the cohort squad "January Cohort".
You approve once — and all three steps run in sequence. If step 2 fails for any reason (e.g., a task title is missing required fields), Michelle pauses, tells you what went wrong, and asks how you'd like to proceed rather than silently rolling back or skipping ahead.
Coaches using Coachful who leverage Michelle for program setup report cutting their initial curriculum-build time by more than half. Batching your instructions into a single prompt is the fastest path to a fully scaffolded program.
Why Michelle requires confirmation for write actions
AI assistants that act without confirmation can cause real damage — deleted content, mis-scheduled sessions, unintended client notifications. Coachful's coaching platform serves real paying clients, so a guard rail on destructive or irreversible operations isn't optional. Michelle's confirmation gate exists for three reasons:
- Irreversibility. Some actions — like sending a message to all squad members or cancelling a booked session — can't be undone cleanly. A five-second confirmation step is worth avoiding an awkward client conversation.
- Accuracy. Natural language is ambiguous. "Delete last week's tasks" could mean different things. The confirmation summary is Michelle's way of showing you her interpretation before it matters.
- Trust building. The confirmation loop teaches you what Michelle can do. Over time you'll learn to write tighter prompts, and the flow becomes faster rather than friction-ful.
For a deeper look at everything Michelle can action on your behalf, see What Michelle can do in your Coachful workspace.
Read-only requests: no confirmation needed
Not every Michelle interaction requires a confirmation step. Anything that only reads data runs instantly:
- "How many clients are enrolled in my Momentum Program?"
- "Show me all sessions booked for next week."
- "Summarise the last 7 days of messages in the January Cohort squad."
- "What's my current offer pricing?"
Michelle responds with the answer directly — no approval step, no friction. This keeps lookups and diagnostics fast, which is especially useful mid-session when you need a quick fact without breaking your coaching flow.
Michelle in the context of roles and permissions
Michelle respects the role system built into Coachful. What she can execute on your behalf depends entirely on your own permissions:
- super_coach (owner): full write access across all programs, squads, billing, and settings.
- coach: can action most program and client operations; cannot modify billing or workspace-level settings.
- editor: can create and edit content (pages, blog posts, programs) but has limited access to client records.
- virtual_assistant: scoped permissions set by the owner; Michelle will only confirm actions within that scope.
If you ask Michelle to perform an action outside your permission level, she won't show a confirmation — she'll tell you upfront that the action requires a higher role, and suggest who on your team can perform it instead.
For full details on roles, see Roles and permissions in Coachful.
Troubleshooting: common issues with Michelle's confirmation flow
Michelle confirmed but nothing changed
This usually means the action hit a validation error after you approved. Michelle will surface the error message in the chat thread — for example, "The session type requires a duration to be set before it can be published." Fix the flagged field and re-prompt her.
Michelle keeps re-asking for confirmation on the same action
If the conversation thread has gone quiet for more than a few minutes, Michelle treats the confirmation as expired and will re-summarise the action before executing. This prevents stale approvals from running unexpectedly. Just confirm again to proceed.
I said "yes" but Michelle didn't execute
Check that your reply was in the same thread as the confirmation message. If you opened a new Michelle conversation, she has no context from the previous one. Re-issue your original request in the new thread.
Michelle's summary describes the wrong action
This means your original prompt was ambiguous. Don't confirm — instead, clarify in plain language what you actually want. For example, replace "update that program" with "update the Week 2 tasks in my 12-Week Mindset Reset program." Michelle will re-draft the action and re-confirm.
I approved a write action by mistake
Act quickly. If the action was a create or update, Michelle can often reverse it: ask her immediately — "Undo what you just did" — and she'll attempt a reversal with its own confirmation step. Deleted records and sent messages may not be recoverable; contact support@coachful.co if you need help with data recovery.
Michelle won't action something I know I have permission for
Try signing out and back into your Coachful workspace at app.coachful.co/sign-in to refresh your session token. If the issue persists, check your org role under Settings → Team to confirm your role hasn't changed.
Best practices for faster, cleaner Michelle interactions
Getting fluid with Michelle's confirmation flow is mostly about writing clearer prompts. Here are the habits that make the biggest difference:
- Name things explicitly. Use the exact program name, squad name, or client name rather than "that one" or "the new one". Michelle can look up names, but explicit references eliminate a back-and-forth lookup step.
- State the full intent upfront. Instead of "add a task", say "add a task called 'Weekly Reflection Journal' to Day 5 of Week 2 in my 8-Week Strength Program". One message, one confirmation, done.
- Batch related actions. If you need to update five tasks, list all five in a single prompt. Michelle will confirm them together and execute in one pass.
- Use Michelle for repetitive scaffolding. Building a new cohort program? Ask Michelle to duplicate a template program, rename it, update the dates, and assign it to a new squad — all in one go.
The coaches who get the most out of Michelle treat her like a senior operations assistant: give her full context upfront, review her confirmation summary carefully, then approve with confidence.
Ready to put Michelle to work?
Michelle's confirmation system is built to give you speed and safety — you stay in control of every change while offloading the actual clicking and configuring to your AI co-pilot. Once you get comfortable with the flow, you'll find yourself delegating entire program-build sessions, client onboarding sequences, and squad setup tasks to Michelle in minutes.
If you're not yet on Coachful, start your free trial and meet Michelle firsthand. Already a member? Sign in to your workspace and open the Michelle panel from your coach dashboard — just type what you want to do and let her take it from there.
For more guides on working with Michelle, browse the Michelle help category or see prompt ideas for common coaching tasks.