Employee training is at crossroads. The COVID-pandemic has forced people to embrace new technologies and remote work has become the norm. One of the technologies that has really benefited from the sudden change is virtual reality (VR).
On top of offering a pandemic safe way to train people, research suggests that memory retention after a VR experience is higher than after viewing video or text-based learning materials. With VR, you don’t just observe the training process, you experience it, leaving an indelible imprint into your subconsciousness. Lately, the possibilities of VR training have been understood in the business world, because when used correctly, virtual reality really can enhance company’s training processes and minimize cost.
The purpose of this article is to take a closer look at five different Finnish companies who have already adopted VR and show you, the person reading this, how it can be beneficial in several ways.
1. Mehiläinen
Finnish healthcare company Mehiläinen uses virtual reality for surgical training. With the use of a VR headset and haptic pen doctor can make choices and notes related to a surgical operation safely. In virtual reality the trainees get to practice different surgical procedures in an immersive and risk-free setting. In VR, an error doesn’t put the patient at risk, plus the training gives the same operational reliability as a real situation.
With the help of VR training, the trainees can take their time to familiarize themselves with patient’s anatomy and this improves the safety of surgeries and decrease the number of accidents.
2. Novia University of Applied Sciences & Aboa Mare
For a long time, simulator training has been an essential part in seafaring schools. Now, with a new virtual reality extension, it is now possible to train more immersively than ever before.
We at CTRL Reality in cooperation with Aboa Mare Maritime Academy and Training Center have created a virtual reality extension to simulator bridges for training emergency steering. With this new solution, the trainees can now step into the steering gear compartment in virtual reality and steer the vessel by operating the virtual levers. The virtual steering gear compartment communicates with the simulator in real time. In the exercise, one trainee acts as the officer on watch, giving instructions through a phone to the trainee in the steering gear room. The compass and rudder angles are shown both on the virtual indicators of the VR steering gear compartment and physical indicators at the simulator bridge. The steering maneuvers from the steering gear compartment are relayed to the simulator.
To summarize, the customer didn’t have to build an expensive physical steering gear compartment simulator, therefore, this case showcases how VR can bring substantial financial savings without compromising on the quality of the training.
3. Linde
Linde has an extensive training program for their gas tanker truck drivers where one of the more critical tasks is the loading and unloading of liquid oxygen and nitrogen. Mastering the task is rather difficult and time consuming, therefore Linde became interested in making their training processes more effective through virtual reality.
As alluded above, the purpose of this VR training is to teach the loading and unloading process in a safe and immersive manner. In addition, the VR training allows the company to train their employees without the need to use the gas tanker truck, hence freeing up the vehicle for their business operations. Moreover, the drivers will be able to train and test their skills more flexibly than before.
However, it should be said that even VR training has its own deficiencies. For example, you can’t mimic the weight of an object or the exact feel of a lever. But on the other hand, virtual reality has proven to be effective when you must learn a certain order or familiarize yourself with a new process. A great example of this is the TTS’ Virtual Bus Driver Trainer. It was created to help bus driver trainees to practice pre-inspection of buses before taking on the road. The results were impressive as those trainees who had partaken in the VR training were much faster and made less errors than those who just watched an informational video before the real inspection.
Linde’s VR solution has the same basic principles. Virtual reality makes the training process repeatable, decreases the number of mistakes in real-life, and reduces costs.
4. Wärtsilä
Wärtsilä is committed to creating and maintaining a secure and healthy workplace. For them safety is the number one priority. That is why they chose CTRL 360 Training as a part of their work safety program.
In short, the company uses our solution as a training tool for work hazard identification. Different environments from several manufacturing plants photographed and then training material (additional information, questions, photos) was later added with our easy-to-use editor. This allows the customer to efficiently create training scenarios that are best suited for their needs.
The feedback has been overwhelmingly positive across the board. Even the more experienced workers praised the solution for being fun and motivational.
5. Duodecim & the City of Helsinki
Duodecim Oppiportti and the City of Helsinki’s Pätijä project set out to solve if virtual reality could be applied to nursing training. The personnel who partook in the project trained the ABCs of resuscitation, different follow-up procedures and communication between professionals in a realistic virtual environment.
One of the biggest benefits of VR is that you can undergo scenarios that occur rarely or are difficult to organize. For example, how should one act when patient’s status takes a turn for the worse? These kinds of situations happen rarely on emergency duty and according to studies are difficult to train, however through VR these can be effectively simulated anywhere at any time.
The project feedback was very positive. Here you can see a couple of examples:
- 91% of respondents thought the VR training was either very good (50%) or good (41%).
- 96% of respondents thought VR was a beneficial in nursing training
- 92% of respondents said that the VR training strengthened their emergency duty know-how
- 88% of respondents said that VR training strengthened consulting skills
Summary
When used correctly virtual reality can help companies to achieve significant financial savings, reduce training times and overall make the whole training process more effective. Nearly anyone can utilize VR training, though, some organizations are more suitable than others.
Do you have a lot of site-specific training exercises that require travelling? What about dangerous tasks? Are accidents a common occurrence in your organization? Does your organization have tasks that are difficult to train/simulate? Do your training processes take a lot of time? Do you want to excite and motivate your trainees in a never-before-seen way?
If you answered ‘’yes’’ to any of these questions, VR training might be the right solution for you.
Contact us here.