\u201cPeople are using AI tools that weren\u2019t built for mental health,\u201d warns Pickett. \u201cGeneral-use chatbots [are] built to do a lot of things. And they\u2019re amazing. But they were not designed to take somebody who maybe has an acute mental illness and support them through a difficult time.\u201d <\/p>\n
Last year Pickett scaled back Headspace\u2019s full-time therapists, moving them to part-time and contractor roles, to cut costs. At about the same time he launched the chatbot Ebb, which on Monday is upgrading from text-only to voice. Pickett insists this service is not designed for serious mental health issues and the company still offers remote therapists. Chatbots help \u201ceveryday emotional regulation\u201d with bouts of anxiety or sleeplessness. \u201cThat\u2019s frankly what a large part of the population really needs\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009Something to talk to, to reflect, to help process their emotions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pickett says the company has developed a safety system to identify high-risk language and escalate serious concerns for human clinician review. All messages are monitored for potential risks, including suicidal and homicidal ideation, self-harm, domestic violence, substance use, eating disorders and abuse of vulnerable populations. When the conversation takes a turn into this territory, Ebb directs the user to crisis care, and ends the conversation.<\/p>\n
Research finds well-designed chatbots can help with mental health issues, and some users find it easier to open up to them. \u201cThere\u2019s some really interesting things that are evolving around people\u2019s openness to put things on the table with a conversational AI in a way that they might not have done with a human therapist,\u201d says Pickett.<\/p>\n
![\"Three](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/https:\/\/d1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net\/production\/1a1f8402-cd2d-4851-b631-16378febc4f9.jpg\")
The Headspace app includes a chatbot feature called Ebb, which is upgrading from text-only to voice and is designed to help \u2018everyday emotional regulation\u2019 \u00a9 Headspace<\/p>\n
He is \u201cbullish\u201d on AI\u2019s potential. But \u201cwe have to make sure we protect against the downside\u201d. At stake is the company\u2019s reputation. \u201cWe\u2019ve got 15 years of a brand that we\u2019ve built up, building user trust, and we really do not want to lose that.\u201d<\/p>\n
The wellbeing sector is fiercely competitive. Headspace has lower downloads and monthly average users than its larger rival, Calm, according to Sensor Tower, the\u00a0market intelligence company. But new downloads for both have fallen. In the third quarter of this year, Sensor Tower says Headspace\u2019s monthly average users were 12 per cent lower than a year earlier.<\/p>\n
Headspace says the fall reflects a shift from direct subscriptions to employer and health plans. Pickett says that, despite economic uncertainty, employers are not pulling back from wellbeing benefits. \u201cMental health continues to be a top two or three issue for companies\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009I think most of them want a solution that\u2019s more than\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009the \u2018call up a phone number\u2019 kind of model.\u201d<\/p>\n
He hopes more insurers will follow Cigna by adding Headspace to employer schemes. \u201cHistorically, the only thing health plans covered was clinical\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009With employers, you go 10,000, 50,000 100,000 at a time, but with health plans, you go millions at a time. Ultimately, that could become the biggest part of our business.\u201d<\/p>\n
As a private company, Headspace does not disclose detailed financial information. Pickett says last year it made \u201cnorth of $200mn in revenue\u201d and operates \u201cebitda profitable\u201d.<\/p>\n
Pickett gained an insight into mental health struggles at the start of his career, when he spent nine years in the navy as an F-18 pilot, including two deployments to the Gulf. Behind him is a model and a large photo of F-18 aircraft. \u201cWe were put in stressful situations \u2014 a bunch of 18-year-olds to largely 30-somethings, away from their families. Stress, anxiety, [and] later forms of depression were out there, and people were trying to figure out how to deal with that.\u201d Then, the attitude was \u201csuck it up\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n
His time in the navy provided a \u201cgreat learning opportunity for management\u201d, he says.<\/p>\n
That might have helped when he took over at Headspace, and oversaw job cuts. \u201cThere were still elements of the merger that we were cleaning up. Systems integration, two products that you\u2019re pushing into one. There [were] some cultural differences.\u201d<\/p>\n
Employees, he realised, were drawn by \u201cthe mission\u201d of improving mental health; it \u201creally matters deeply to people who work there\u201d. <\/p>\n
That has led to\u00a0some criticism\u00a0on\u00a0Glassdoor,\u00a0the anonymous employer review site, that Headspace\u2019s culture is more focused on numbers than on wellbeing. One former employee wrote: \u201cIt\u2019s quite ironic that so much of their content centres around taking care of your mental health at work.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pickett says the company is now in \u201ca much better place\u201d. \u201cI\u2019m happy with the size\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009today [about 400 staff]. People are definitely pushed. We have a lot to do.\u201d <\/p>\n
An IPO might be a long-term goal but for now his focus is on building a \u201csustainable, healthy business\u201d. \u201cYou want the flexibility to move and evolve and invest.\u201d<\/p>\n
A day in the life of Tom Pickett<\/p>\n
6:45am Wake up and check my Oura smart ring stats \u2014 seven hours of actual sleep is the goal. I then grab a coffee for the road and head to our San Francisco office.<\/p>\n
Morning This is my peak problem-solving and creative-thinking window, so I frontload the day with meetings and anything that requires sharp thinking and clear decision-making. <\/p>\n
Lunch When I\u2019m not travelling, I eat at the office and try to catch up with others, all while staying on top of emails and Slack messages.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Afternoon Some days are dedicated to strategy deep dives, others are all about product. I do \u201cskip-level\u201d meetings to keep a pulse on what is going on through the organisation, do customer calls and meet my direct reports.<\/p>\n
Evening It\u2019s very important to me to get home for family dinner. With four kids, three still at home, this is the time to connect as a family. Everyone\u2019s at the table, sharing their day. <\/p>\n
I\u2019ll try to squeeze in a run or walk. The rest of the night is spent helping with homework while prepping for the next day\u2019s meetings. We have a no TV rule during the week.<\/p>\n
Before bed, I wind down with Headspace, shut down all screens, and give myself the best shot at hitting my seven-hour sleep target.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before meeting for this interview, Tom Pickett opened Headspace, the app best known for mindfulness, and did a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179253,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[220,218,219,61,60,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-179252","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179252\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}