As the old proverb goes, “Necessity is the mother of invention,” and workplaces around the world have been forced to innovate and find new ways of working over the last year as the COVID-19 pandemic continues. But for companies to thrive in this new landscape, they need to embrace the opportunity to do things differently and to take a bold step forward, rather than just seeking to replicate existing processes in a remote working world.
Training is one of the areas where this agility and innovation is particularly important, both because a disparate workforce requires a new set of skills, and because delivering effective training remotely requires fresh thinking. Now is the time to consider cutting-edge approaches and solutions that can take workplace training to the next level. Enterprise virtual reality (VR) is one of these solutions.
The prospect of implementing a new technology can seem daunting, especially at a time when businesses are keeping a close eye on costs, but as we move into new ways of operating, we need to push beyond what’s been done previously and make employee learning more effective and more engaging than ever before.
Physically Distant But Not Socially Distant
Until recently, remote learning largely was restricted to resources such as e-learning programs, Webinars, digital knowledge bases, podcasts, and videos, with limited interactivity and little scope for hands-on practice.
While these methods all have a place in the remote learning suite, it is also clear they are not enough. This is not just about the dramatic change that has taken place over the last year, but also about wider workplace shifts and trends that have been happening in recent years. Millennials and Generation Zers comprise an increasing proportion of the global workforce, and these “tech native” generations expect the kind of flexible, intuitive, effective technology at work that they engage with at home.
Enterprise VR can provide this. It immerses users in realistic, simulated training scenarios and can include gamification elements that make remote learning collaborative and competitive. Training can be delivered in manageable chunks, avoiding information overload. And learners can work at their own pace and focus on particular areas, receiving instant feedback. As more data is collected, programs can be tailored even more specifically to individual learners and learning styles.
Wearing a headset and immersed in a realistic virtual environment, trainees are much less likely to be distracted and much more likely to be fully engaged in the training program. This may help to drive better outcomes in terms of information absorption and retention. Studies carried out by the University of Cambridge’s Cyber-Human Lab found that VR training methods resulted in 55 percent faster task completion, as well as significantly higher quality of work and learning retention.
VR also can provide meaningful collaboration and teamwork opportunities—increasingly valuable in a remote working world—as trainees can meet, interact, and compete in the same virtual space even while physically distant.
Ever-Improving Organizations
However, VR doesn’t just make training more effective and enjoyable for learners; it also has the potential to provide more wide-reaching organizational benefits. As the way that we work and learn is dramatically reconfigured, now is the time to consider how we can get our organizations into the best shape possible.
VR enables trainers to measure engagement and track learner progress remotely, and to provide real-time guidance and assessment from any location. But it also captures a wealth of data. Every action taken, word spoken, and task completed can be fed into a dashboard, resulting in detailed reports that provide businesses with a rich picture of their workforce.
Historically, it often has been challenging for Learning and Development (L&D) departments to evaluate training programs and prove their worth. But VR makes the benefits of training much more measurable and can pinpoint areas for improvement. Crucially, though, it also can give guidance on improving wider business processes. Because the data is so insightful and detailed, its use can reach beyond training to indicate other tweaks that could be made to improve an organization or to highlight a skills or personnel gap.
More Flexible, Accessible Tech
As noted, changing workforce demographics and a rapid shift to remote working and learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic mean that enterprise VR now has more relevance than ever. But crucially, this also has coincided with some watershed moments in the technology itself, making it more easily accessible to a wider range of businesses.
Over the last year, the enterprise VR landscape has changed significantly, as the hardware has become more affordable and the solutions have become more sophisticated and flexible. For example, the Immerse virtual enterprise platform (VEP) now integrates with standalone devices such as the Oculus Quest. Businesses now can roll out enterprise VR training programs using cost-effective, portable devices that allow users to engage with a virtual world using just a headset and controllers. As training is completed, detailed data is generated, and can be saved to a central store and sent to a company’s learning management system (LMS). VR training sessions also can be broadcast via a browser to other users.
The Future Is Here Today
The last year has brought radical and lasting changes to workforces around the world, pushing many business leaders to consider how they can “future-proof” their businesses. At the same time, technological advances have democratized VR, making it both more accessible and more powerful.
Enterprise VR holds huge promise for the businesses willing to explore it, as it delivers effective, engaging training that also includes the sociable, collaborative, and tactile elements of in-person learning. It also delivers a wealth of data, helping businesses to accurately track progress and to incrementally improve training programs and their organizations as a whole, at a time when every improvement counts.
At this pivotal juncture, we need to consider how we can make our workplaces better than ever before. Is your business brave enough to explore the benefits of enterprise VR?
