Transcript
Mark:
Welcome to PeopleTech, the podcast of the HCM Technology Report. I’m Mark Feffer.
Mark:
Virti is a learning platform that emphasizes experiential learning. It’s founder and CEO, Alex Young, has an interesting background. He’s a trauma and orthopedic surgeon, and also a gamer. Four years before starting Virti, he founded Medical, an education company for healthcare. Alex is my guest today, and we’re going to talk about how learning is evolving, what works and what might not, and Virti’s approach to it all, on this edition of PeopleTech.
Mark:
Alex, welcome. You have an interesting path. Started as a surgeon, and now you’re running a technology company. I wondered if you could just tell me about that. What was your thinking behind it and how did you do it?
Alex:
Yeah. Great question. So, as you say, my background is originally in medicine, so I trained as an orthopedic surgeon, but during my training, I’ve always been a bit of a geek, both in terms of being a geek for learning, but also a geek for building companies. So, I built a company that did in-person training for doctors and nurses. In fact, when I was at medical school in the United Kingdom, and then when I progressed onto my surgical training, I built a digital business that did something quite similar for doctors and nurses on a global scale.
Alex:
And I’ve always been very, very interested in how we can get the best out of our people in the healthcare setting. And we’ve seen this during the pandemic, where doctors and nurses on the front line have put themselves at risk. They have worked diligently to help their patients, putting their own lives and the lives of their relatives at risk to help people. But sometimes their training isn’t as good as it could be. And for me, my passion was always about building something that helped people in any sector, and anywhere in the world, to really get the best out of themselves.
Alex:
And the idea for Virti was, specifically, how can we scale in person training, and particularly around soft skills training. So, in medicine, I did a lot of communication skills training, such as how to break bad news, or what’s called deescalate an angry patient, an angry relative or angry colleague. And those soft skills are some of the things that I was able to utilize as I moved into a business setting. And I think that’s some of the most important things for anyone anywhere in the world to learn. And so, that’s really where the impetus of Virti came from. And we’ve been very fortunate to train a lot of organizations, both in healthcare and outside.
Mark:
Can you tell me a bit more specifically about what Virti does?
Alex:
Yeah. So Virti is a digital cloud based platform, really, that focuses around soft skills training for anyone in any kind of sector, really. So, a lot of what we do is we use either video or AI-powered avatars for people to go through virtual conversations around a number of different topics that happen commonly in any workplace. So, that might be something like how to close a sales deal. It might be how to give feedback to a colleague. It might be how to hire or fire someone.
Alex:
And a lot of those scenarios play out in such a way that you can educate and train people at scale on the best ways to do each of those things. Most importantly, the system immerses people into these scenarios, and the scenarios are accessible on mobile or desktop, or in virtual reality headsets for that added piece of immersion.
Alex:
And then what our system does, it collects data on how people perform, specifically around their conversation choices, how they communicate, what they do, and that then informs the learner, and it informs the organization as a whole, where there might be some unidentified bias, either in the learner as they hire people, or just a communication deficit, in terms of how people lead or how people communicate within the organization.
Mark:
Now, there’s obviously a lot of learning technology companies out there in the market right now. So, how do you see Virti fitting in? I mean, first of all, what do you do that others don’t do? And how should a chief learning officer look at Virti as they’re looking at their overall stack?
Alex:
So, what our real focus is on two points in an employee’s journey. So, one is that first onboarding piece. So, whenever a new employee starts in any company, you’ve got a certain amount of time to train them up, and get them to value. And with our immersive technology, again, because I’m a learning geek, we’ve done a lot of research into how the platform works. And we’ve got some case studies that show that people who utilize our platform retain information during their onboarding for longer, and you can actually reduce your onboarding.
Alex:
And if you think about things like sales training, where getting people to value within an organization is so important in terms of revenue, that’s really one touch point that we go in. And again, with our system, one of the big differentiators is it’s research proven, in that we’ve done some randomized control trials to share that it works. But it also really focuses down on those soft skills based experiences, and specifically immersing people in practical and repeatable soft skills training at scale. So, we’re really trying to digitize that role play.
Alex:
The second point is, then, the upskilling and reskilling at the managerial level, where we really focus on things like feedback, both behavioral feedback, good and bad feedback, when that’s delivered to employees at performance reviews. And that really focuses managers around empowering their people, getting the best out of them, reducing any communication complaints within organizations, and really ensuring that any employee in any organization has the best skills to help them perform at their best within the workforce.
Alex:
So, I think three things differentiate our platform from everything that’s out there. One is the research and evidence behind it. Two is the actual soft skills content, and the ability for people to practice that in a very realistic environment. And then, the third piece is we collect a lot of data for how people perform in those environments and our organizations are able to make things bespoke for their organization. So, they can configure all of these scenarios, all of the avatars, all of the video based training to their own organization, without the need to come back to us if they don’t want to.
Mark:
Now, there’s so many companies out there in the HCM tech space who, they’re constantly gathering data, and then they’re using it either to inform their products or some are even selling it back to the market. Are you doing anything like that with your data? How are you using your data, besides just looking at it?
Alex:
It’s a great question. And it’s actually one of the key reasons I founded the company and left my job in medicine, which I absolutely loved. And that was, there’s no real way to understand what good communication skills or good soft skills look like from data, because the gold standard of how soft skills is taught is using role plays. And when that is delivered, it’s very, very variable. If people are assessing it or noting down people’s communication skills, there’s an element of bias in whoever is administering the scoring for that, if it’s an observer or a teacher or trainer.
Alex:
And so, one of the really cool things about Virti is we collect a lot of this information digitally, and then we can compare peers within the same organization and see who a top performer is, in terms of communication. But we can also compare on a much more macro, global scale and look at how communication skills are delivered. And then, we’re planning to feed that back to the market, to educate people through our annual insight surveys.
Mark:
And I’d like to take a step back for a moment and look at the overall learning landscape today, not just Virti, but everybody. And I’m curious about what your view of learning right now is. How important is it to employers and how important is it to employees?
Alex:
I think it’s a fantastic question, and I think there are elements where we’ve seen, during the pandemic, learning has become the number one focus for many organizations, in terms of upskilling their remote workforce, in terms of empowering their people and in terms of increasing adoption rates. However, in other areas, it’s still lagging behind some other elements of businesses where focus is put into things like revenue generation or technology and automation. And I think, for me personally, having left a big organization, the UK’s NHS, which is one of the biggest employers of humans on the planet, really actually upskilling and empowering your people is absolutely vital.
Alex:
And for me, personally, I am wearing my Fitbit all the time. I’m always going out and finding more ways to learn as an individual. And as we’re getting more and more younger people into our workforce, they’re looking at the same thing. Their value, really, is what can we learn? How can we train? How can we better ourselves? And I think, if organizations don’t look at that future of the workforce, and don’t cater to their needs, that they’re going to really come up short in this very remote environment we’re running into. So, I think, to summarize, some organizations are doing a fantastic job and are adopting new technologies and empowering their people. Others are still lagging behind a little bit, but that’s okay, because they’ll see some of the case studies coming out, and they’ll listen to their workforce, and I’m sure we’ll adopt things in time.
Mark:
Now, obviously the technology’s becoming more complex, more powerful. And when you talk to people about that, they say that’s going to be great for learning. It’s going to improve learning. I’d like to get a little bit more specific. This more complex, more powerful technology, what’s it mean for learning, for both learners and the employers?
Alex:
I think Virti, itself, started off with a real focus, not necessarily on the technology, but on how we could solve the problem of improving organizational emotional quotient, EQ, or empathy, through better soft skills training. And when we were looking at how to digitize what is essentially role play or on the job, what we call experiential learning, which is where a lot of that learning actually comes from, we opted for one technology, which is virtual reality, because it could put people into these very immersive, realistic situations, and have that emotional impact that soft skills often drive when people observe them, or practice them in person.
Alex:
What we have seen, in terms of technology adoption, is that technology, whether it’s actually a mobile device, whether it’s a new computer system, it’s got to be equal. It’s got to have organizational security, in order for people to adopt it. And I think, often, when we see these hype cycles, whether it’s blockchain, whether it’s virtual reality, whether it’s mobile devices back in the day, you’ve got to cater to the needs of the organization. You’ve got to make sure that things are easy to implement, both from the organization’s point of view, in terms of security, in terms of onboarding people, how to use that technology. In terms of hardware in the case of things like virtual reality headsets being rolled out.
Alex:
But also, just for the actual learners, again, I go back to my time working in a large organization where I had about 10 different passwords, I think, at one point, before password managers were brought in. And even just simple things like that, where new technologies are integrating into existing LMSs or experience management systems, is absolutely vital.
Alex:
And I think what we do, that we found works well, is really giving our organizations, our customers, the choice of how they want to deploy things. So, we don’t force people to use just virtual reality headsets. If they want to use desktop or mobile devices first, because that’s an easier rollout, that’s absolutely fine. And again, we really focus down on the learning outcomes, and actually the behavior change and the organizational goals over pushing a particular type of technology, which I think has certainly been one of our focuses and we’ve benefited from.
Mark:
Is this all a good thing? I mean, the increasing use of technology. I think, in some industries, they try to, essentially, hide behind the technology. Save money by eliminating people. Others try to really add value. Where’s the whole learning world fit into that?
Alex:
Yeah, I think another fantastic question. I think I always look back to my time doing something like surgery, where it’s a mix of very technical skills, soft skills, and very high pressure environments, which is analogous to really any high pressure setting, whether it’s sales or anything. For me, it’s always got to go back to what is the actual needs of the organization, what is the needs of the learner, over pushing a certain type of technology in front of people. Something like surgery, something like sales, there’s always going to be on the job learning. There’s always going to be elements of in person coaching, doing self reflection.
Alex:
And people want lots of different ways to learn, whether it’s reading a book, whether it’s putting on a virtual reality headset, whether it’s learning in person. The learner’s journey goes through all of those stages to master something. And I think with technologies like virtual reality, what it allows for is to get more reps in, to get to that mastery level. So, for me, when I was training as a surgeon, just like I practiced my soft skills every day, just like I practiced my coaching skills every day in work, it’s all about repetition and reflection. And if you can digitize some of that and speed up that learning cycle, and reduce that forgetting curve, that’s where I think technology fits. I think if people start talking about technology replacing things, like in-person training, that’s when you need to start to run for the hills.
Mark:
Over the next two or three years, what are the technical changes coming that really get you excited?
Alex:
Well, I think I’m a little bit biased, but obviously as the owner of a VR and immersive technology company, we’re seeing a lot of buzz around the Metaverse, and a lot of investment in it from things like Microsoft, from Facebook, where they’ve changed the name of Facebook to Meta. I think these shared virtual environments, which we jumped on about three years ago as an early adopter, in terms of a training provider adopting those solutions, then are really coming to the forefront of people’s minds. And it’s going to be very, very exciting as both the providers of the hardware, as well as organizations begin to adopt them at scale. So, I think that, in the near term, is one thing that really, really excites me.
Alex:
I think the other thing, in terms of technology, that really excites me is actually, it’s a little bit boring, but it’s 5G. So, I think, actually, just the communication infrastructure is going to make a huge difference in terms of technology adoption at scale. If you think of how even we access emails outside of work, if you don’t have a good wifi connection or you don’t have good internet, it’s incredibly slow. It reduces the user and the learner experience, and it reduces any sort of data plays that the organizations are making. And I think that ability to have a very, very fast bandwidth wherever you are in the world all plays into the current work landscape, which is very remote, and allowing people to work from anywhere and learn on the job. And I think that’s going to really revolutionize infrastructure in organizations and help them to adopt more technology at scale.
Mark:
Alex, thanks very much for taking the time to talk today.
Alex:
Thank you so much. It’s been an absolute pleasure.
Mark:
My guest today has been Alex Young, the founder and CEO of Virti. And this has been PeopleTech, the podcast of the HCM Technology Report. We’re a publication of Recruiting Daily. We’re also a part of Evergreen Podcasts. To see all of their programs, visit www.evergreenpodcasts.com. And to keep up with HR Technology, visit the HCM Technology Report every day. We’re the most trusted source of news in the HR tech industry. Find us at www.hcmtechnologyreport.com. I’m Mark Feffer.
Image: Virti
