NeXR Technology Offers New Corporate Training Possibilities – Enrich Conferences & Safety Training With Immersive Learning
Corporate Training meets Immersive Learning with the NeXR’s Educational Technology.
Corporate training has a somewhat undeserved reputation for being staid and boring. What if technology can deliver truly immersive learning experiences at a fraction of the costs of traditional training? NeXR has developed an immersive VR learning solution for companies to achieve better training results in a virtual environment.With Covid-19, “Zoom or webinar fatigue” has set in for many learners. The last thing they want is another (training) webinar. To achieve better outcomes, leveraging virtual reality’s immersive learning environment is vital to keep learners engaged while giving them a chance to apply their training in real-world scenarios.
Webinars may not be answer for online training
Webinars have boomed in 2020 due to Covid-19 but there are limitations to this medium of communication. Many learners mute themselves while continuing their daily work and not paying full attention to the material that is presented. There is also the risk that webinars sound too theoretical while not giving hands-on experience to reinforce learning points. This means that such corporate training may be given to indifferent and unfocused learners who can’t practice what was taught.
Ineffective training can lead to low productivity, inefficiency and poor customer service. No wonder senior management often ask learning and development (L&D) to upskill employees quickly and effectively. Yet according to Gartner, 70% of staff report that they do not have mastery of the skills they need for their jobs.
So how can VR enrich online training? NeXR CEO Markus Peuler: “With Covid-19, annual learning conferences, training seminars and safety training events are affected, but these events are more important than ever before as companies seek to adapt to ‘the new normal’ and rebound as quickly as possible. It is vital to not settle for webinars which will be met by a shrug of the shoulders by learners. VR offers the flexibility to tailor-make courses based on companies’ needs to better engage learners.”
Nicola Mizon, Head of Operations at NeXR Seminar: “VR opens up new possibilities for learning. At annual conferences, speakers can bring attendees to explore real-world environments to bring their points to life.Likewise, VR-enabled safety training can bring attendees to the factory floor to apply what they have learned and familiarize themselves with fire escape routes. Such interactivity will result in far better training outcomes relative to PowerPoint slides shared over a webinar.”
New VR technologies offer new possibilities
A PwC study estimates that VR training will contribute $294 billion to the global economy by 2030. This study also noted that VR learners felt 3.75 times more emotionally connected to the content relative to offline learners and 2.3 times more connected than e-learners.
The NeXR Seminar is a leading example of VR learning technology and was realized with the Scientific Advisor of the project, Alexander Sascha Wolf (Dictyonomie Institute for value-based networking). “Covid-19 has been described as the biggest driver for technology adoption.L&D professionals have an opportunity to reshape enterprise-based training. Virtual reality learning is likely to be part of ‘the new normal’ even when travel can be resumed freely. Apart from travel costs of offline training participants, there is a cost to assign event space for seminars and training but with VR solutions, such costs can be reduced,” says Wolf. “For operational or safety trainings this also means giving trainees more time to practice virtually until they hit the required level of proficiency,” adds Peuler.
Online-offline learning integration
Peuler notes that, “The recent IFA is an example of how online-offline integration can be enabled by technology to reach more audiences and facilitate learning about new products. Virtual demo rooms and virtual exhibition booths facilitate interactivity while traditional exhibition booths continue to engage visitors. For example, Samsung continued having a traditional booth while building a virtual, 3D tour experience – a “choose-your-own adventure” VR demo – for its media partners. Participants navigated around a digital house that contains over 20 different Samsung devices to learn about what the value they could bring to users.”
Similarly, a VR learning symposium can exist alongside a traditional symposium, featuring a web stream of a keynote speech with the speaker perfectly represented in 3D with gestures and facial expressions and using a virtual environment to present his/her use case(s) to virtual attendees from around the world. Meanwhile, attendees at the physical event (say at headquarters) can see the virtual environment which is projected on-site. Furthermore, the attendees at both offline and online events may ask the speaker questions based on these virtual environments and interact with one another to better apply training to their daily challenges.
“The impact and cost savings are immense when you extend your training materials to these physical and virtual participants. Engagement is the first step to more focused and effective learning,” says Peuler. “Research shows that VR learners are four times more focused during training than their e-learning peers, since it facilitates experiential learning. It is better to incorporate VR learning earlier rather than to find out that webinar-based e-learning alone is not achieving the required outcomes.” Peuler concludes.
