Training Industry Magazine - March/April 2019 - 50

G L O B A L
O U T LO O K

HOW DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION IS
DISRUPTING LEARNING
BY SHELLEY OSBORNE

As learning and development (L&D)
professionals, we're no strangers to
the term "digital transformation." Most
people think digital transformation is all
about technology, but it's really about
people, process and technology. This
digital evolution has occurred quickly
and is affecting every aspect of business,
including product and service design,
operations and process. This article will
focus on how digital transformation
is impacting L&D practices and how
we can use disruptive technologies to
upskill or reskill our workforce.

DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION
IS NOT JUST ABOUT
TECHNOLOGY, IT'S ABOUT
PEOPLE, PROCESS
AND TECHNOLOGY.

I recently had the opportunity to co-host
a webinar with Brandon Carson, director
of learning at Delta Air Lines and author
of "Learning in the Age of Immediacy," on
how digital transformation is disrupting
learning. In Carson's current role, he
oversees training and development for
all global airport agents for Delta Air
Lines, and he has previously held L&D
leadership roles at The Home Depot,
Microsoft, and Yahoo!
In the webinar, we examined trends in
digital technology that are transforming

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the way employees learn on the job and
shared real-life case examples. Here are
some of the highlights on how to bring
training to new dimensions through
virtual reality (VR), augmented reality
(AR) and mobile learning.
VIRTUAL REALITY CASE STUDY:
SAFETY TRAINING FOR DELTA
AIR LINES
According to an Udemy for Business
survey of L&D leaders, 18 percent of
organizations plan to incorporate VR
in the next few years. VR technology is
more mature than AR, so we're seeing
some sophisticated learning experiences
and opportunities.
Carson shared how Delta Air Lines
recently conducted a VR proof of concept
for safety training to test its ability
to provide an authentic and scalable
learning environment for high-risk, realworld training scenarios. In the past, it
has been challenging for Delta to train
agents to prepare aircraft for takeoff
because they've relied on using actual
aircrafts during flight times. Agents also
need experience identifying hazardous
material around aircraft and it can be
difficult to implement this training with
real flights.
By creating a VR environment of the
airplane walk-around task, Delta takes
agents out of the work environment
and into a realistic simulation. In the
VR setting, trainers can easily introduce
various types of hazardous material,
which means practice sessions in the VR

environment cover multiple scenarios
that agents may be exposed to in the
real world.
The results from the Delta's proof of
concept were promising: 12 flights were
observed pre- and post-VR training and
five flights performed better post-VR
training, while none performed worse.
Participants received immediate feedback
on their performance, and the majority
of participants rated the experience
as "valuable" or "very valuable." The VR
technology also makes it possible to
identify high-performing agents, who
can then be encouraged to share their
strategies and advice with others.
AUGMENTED REALITY CASE STUDY:
NEW HIRE ONBOARDING AT UDEMY
At Udemy, we've recently introduced
AR into our onboarding program for
new hires. We were inspired to focus on
onboarding when we learned that 79
percent of individuals see opportunities
for improvement in their company's
onboarding process and people who
have had an effective onboarding
experience around company culture are
12 times as likely to feel committed to
their organization.
This led us to outline the following
learning objectives for our program:
*	 Engage employees with our mission.
*	 Share knowledge about Udemy with
our employees.
*	 Create opportunities to bond.

https://business.udemy.com/resources/5-workplace-learning-trends-and-5-predictions-for-2019/?utm_source=training-industry&utm_medium=partner&utm_campaign=march-april-magazine&utm_content=learning-trends-2019 https://business.udemy.com/blog/the-modern-ld-toolkit-how-does-gamification-fit-in/ https://business.udemy.com/blog/the-modern-ld-toolkit-how-does-gamification-fit-in/ https://www.gallup.com/workplace/238085/state-american-workplace-report-2017.aspx https://www.gallup.com/workplace/238085/state-american-workplace-report-2017.aspx

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Training Industry Magazine - March/April 2019