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September 20, 2018
6 minutes read

Walmart is making use of Oculus Go headsets to train employees

Walmart Retail giant Walmart is now getting Oculus Go headsets for all its stores in the U.S. amounting to over…

Walmart

Retail giant Walmart is now getting Oculus Go headsets for all its stores in the U.S. amounting to over 17,000 of the VR headset released this May for use in training employees through Virtual Reality technology after a huge success of a pilot program used to upgrade training at Walmart Academies nationwide.

VR training for over 1 million of its employees across the U.S. will kick off next month with 4 headsets sent to every Walmart supercenter and two units to every Neighborhood Market and discount store enabling access for every Walmart associates to the same training provided for managers and department managers at Walmart Academies.

There are already over 45 activity-based modules for training of employees making use of software provided by VR based immersive learning startup STRIVR whose platform delivers repeatable, realistic and scalable training content which helps for quicker learning and better information retain.

“We are entering a new era of learning, and Walmart continues to lead the way,” said Derek Belch, CEO of STRIVR, which teamed up with Walmart on its initial launch of VR in Academies last year. “The power of VR is real, and when offered as a cornerstone of learning and development, it can truly transform the way an organization trains its people.”

For learning new tech, VR training stands as being particularly helpful as demonstrated by a pilot test at 10 stores this summer where trainees used VR to gain experience on new Pickup Tower units in their stores.

Walmart employee Adrian Carthen made use of this learning mode when it came to her store located in Stockbridge, Georgia and stated it “went beyond hands-on.”

Walmart

“I’m a gamer, so I was excited to use it,” she said. “It felt like you were actually loading the tower. And I could train any time that I wanted and it was done in just a few minutes.”

“Walmart was one of the first companies to benefit from VR’s ability to enrich employee education, and its applications will only grow from here,” said Andy Mathis, Oculus’ head of business partnerships. “What makes it so compelling is that costly, difficult, or otherwise-impossible scenarios and simulations become not only possible, but immediately within reach.”

This new program proves of more ways of application for VR tech across several industries with immersive learning standing as a major part. VR tech helps teach skills that enrich careers of Walmart associates across the U.S. for effective use.

“Yes, we’re focused on helping people do their jobs better every day. But the training we’ve designed is also hopefully training for life,” Walmart’s senior director of digital operations McKeel said in a statement. “That person walks out of their store with new skills and more confidence than they had before – that’s the passion behind this project.”