Last year more companies have been doubling down on their online training programs. The coming year will mark the use of more immersive technologies.
Last year more companies have been doubling down on their online training programs. Not that strange, since we were forced to work from home and still keep current employees engaged by learning new skills and onboard new employees as effortless as possible.
Although the investments in learning programs haven’t been that innovative in 2020, the coming year will mark the use of more immersive technologies. Read all about our VR training trends and predictions for 2021.
Covid-19 has changed the game when it comes to online learning. Last year most companies had to take serious measures to bring their learning programs online. They did this with various degrees of success, making digital learning becoming the new normal. Where 2020 has been about the digitization of training, 2021 will be about humanizing these programs. Since Virtual Reality is the most human form of digital training, the use of this medium will see tremendous growth this year.
The workplace is changing dramatically. Human capital is becoming the biggest differentiator for businesses. Employees demand only the best, making Employee Experience a critical profession.
Most work is now being done remotely, employees are no longer ‘going to work’. They are at home and work comes to them. This is in fact the same for training. Where previously employees went to training (i.e. classroom training), training is now coming to them. This is where immersive technologies, such as VR come in. Virtual Reality is the most perfect medium to deliver high-quality situational training to your home.
As Degreed puts it, upskilling your workforce is a matter of survival. When taking a look at the demand for new skills, learning soft skills is highly represented in the top 10. According to their research, skills employees like to learn the most are soft skills such as leadership, communication, negotiation, entrepreneurship, initiative-taking and adaptability.
The use of Virtual Reality for training soft skills is a no-brainer. It allows for a perfect marriage between theory and practice. By transporting employees to different ‘virtual’ environments they can truly experience that new environment. The closer to reality the better people learn. Take a look at the soft skills training programs from one of our partners.
Where the use of immersive learning was mainly funded by innovation, this year more immersive learning programs will be requested by the business itself. Clear business cases will be made where a positive Return on Investment will mark the use of VR in day-to-day training programs.
Companies will research the use of VR for training and see they can save time and resources, improve employee engagement and have an overall positive business case. Contact us for assistance in developing your business case.
The use of VR has always been labeled as an expensive form of training. Although this is not quite true, companies do have to make time and financial investments in order to develop their own bespoke training programs. This will be a thing of the past with more ready-made VR training content available to use right off-the-shelf.
Where e-learning has made the journey from proprietary to generic content, VR learning is following that same path. More generic training content will become available in VR, such as soft skills modules, emergency procedures and hospitality training. In fact, at Warp VR we are currently making giant leaps in getting high-quality VR training programs available and directly playable.
Please contact us if you would like to join our Warp Store program as a content partner.
The last prediction is not really a fair prediction. Virtual Reality is already almost everywhere. Many households currently have VR headsets in their living room. Sales of the Quest 2 are going through the roof. Many companies have at least experimented with VR within their business and have indicated using VR more and more.
For true mass adoption of VR training, it is vital to start small and frictionless. Where VR headsets have always been seen as something for geeks, nowadays everyone can use them. We at Warp VR are working hard every day to make VR training a commodity, something that is so easy-to-use that you don’t want to go back to the ‘old ways of training’. It is our commitment which we keep on fulfilling in 2021.
