THE BENEFITS OF USING VIRTUAL REALITY FOR CORPORATE TRAINING

Realistic environment

When you hear the words “training session” you probably envision employees sitting in a room together in front of a computer screen or a television.

Information is relayed, but there’s no representation of what learners could face in the course of their work.

VR allows employees to put on a headset and get a realistic feel for what an actual day on the job would entail.

It’s as close as you can get to real-life scenarios.

Freedom to fail

There are some scenarios that just can’t be adequately recreated in a traditional training situation.

In a virtual reality scenario, you have the freedom to fail and mistakes don’t result in lost revenue or any other ill effects to the company.

Instead, learners can look at the mistakes they’ve made, figure out what went wrong, and determine how to keep it from happening again.

Learner engagement

Boring. Useless. Waste of time.

These are all words you may hear to describe the average training session that employees have to endure.

But they don’t have to be the defining characteristics of corporate education.

As soon as someone enters a VR scenario, the real world around them disappears and they’re immersed in the virtual world.

Learners aren’t as susceptible to interruptions and they are fully engaged in the scene before them.

Virtual reality also has enough of a game-like feel to be fun to participate in, too.

Retention rates

The more engaged a learner is in the material, the more they’ll retain the information.

It doesn’t matter how important the information is if the employee can’t remember it.

The virtual reality experience helps a person to be so involved in what’s happening around them that they’re better able to remember the right actions to take and to respond appropriately in an actual scenario.

Pace of learning

It’s well-known that learning by doing is the most effective method of education.

Doing a task repeatedly is the way to gain mastery.

A virtual reality learning experience can speed up this process in a couple ways:

• The increased engagement and retention
• Learners can go through the processes as many times as necessary before they have to do it in a real-world work situation.

The quicker an employee learns to do their job well, the better it is for the company as a whole.

Employee performance

The result of increased engagement, better retention, and learning more quickly is a higher level of employee performance.

Not only do employees have a better understanding of what they’re doing, they also gain the confidence that pushes them to do their job at the highest level.

Cost reduction

Most companies have a limited budget for training purposes.

Traditional training methods often use consumable materials that have to be replaced for each session, but virtual reality is a one-time cost for your company.

Here are two additional ways money is saved as a result of the use of VR for training.

• Damaging expensive equipment. Many industries use equipment that is very pricey and a company can’t afford to take a chance on it being damaged during training exercises. In addition, sometimes more people need to be trained than there are machines to use. Virtual reality allows any number of employees to be trained at one time, with no damage to costly equipment or machinery.
• Travel expenses. As was already mentioned, interviewing distant candidates is achievable when you can make use of virtual reality. In addition, bringing the employees of a large, worldwide company together for training can get very expensive. The costs for a smaller company can add up quickly when plane travel and room and board are calculated. VR training eliminates the need to bring everyone together physically.

Saving money is always a good thing!

Collaboration

Effective training isn’t a solo experience.

Watching videos or reading a manual won’t give anyone insight into how to interact with others in the course of doing their job.

VR simulations can be tailored to include any level of collaboration necessary to make a learner comfortable working with others.

Working on projects with a coworker in another branch or who works remotely is a breeze when it can be done with better technology than simple screen-sharing.

While the price to have the amount of virtual reality equipment may be prohibitive currently, in the near future the costs will come down enough to make it a real possibility.

Streamlined onboarding

Training new employees is vital to the productivity and success of your company.

A fresh hire is much more likely to stay for the long-haul when they have received comprehensive preparation for the job they are expected to do.

The sooner they’re fully integrated into the company, the sooner they can begin contributing to productivity.

Analytics

Most corporate training programs only give enough information to let you know if an employee has completed a reading assignment or has watched a video.

Not very helpful data when what you really want to know is how effective the training has been.

VR training can track a whole host of information, such as:

• How long it took an individual to finish a task.
• The actions they take during a simulated experience.
• If a task was completed in accordance with desired standards.

This data can help managers assess what areas a particular person needs more intensive training in, as well as help them make decisions for the future.

The capability to record employees as they interact with a virtual environment can be a valuable tool for employers. Physical reactions and body language can provide a wealth of information about a person.

Combine learning styles

There are three types of learners: visual, auditory, and kinesthetic.

Virtual reality training is so effective because it successfully blends these three types of learning styles.

Merging visual elements with sound and movement is the best method for retaining new information and being able to recall it in order to use it in a real scenario.