Director of Customer Engagement for TransfrVR Tom Moore

Photo by Jessica Vaughn

FOLEY - The Gateway Initiative, the joint capital project from South Baldwin Chamber of Commerce and the Coastal Alabama Business Chamber, has been heavily focused on apprenticeships in our community and growing the workforce. A focus in the tourism and hospitality industry has gained statewide attention for the efforts of the Gateway team to get hospitality recognized as an apprenticeship cluster.

To help further those efforts, the team is partnering with TransfrVR, a company that specializes in VR technology to help train and engage potential employees in an area and offers a unique way for students to participate in an apprenticeship.

“We partner with industries and school systems to be able to allow candidates to work in the virtual simulation space to improve their skills,” said Tom Moore, director of customer engagement for TransfrVR. “If you’re trying to teach someone to learn a paint booth, to troubleshoot a robot, or to deliver a better front desk experience, there’s a lot of material and training time that goes into that. With these headsets we have the ability to reproduce that environment in a simulation where this one item is all you really need. You don’t need to have the paint booth, you don’t need a whole set of tools, you can experience it all and learn those skills with just one headset.”

Simulations can be monitored and reviewed by potential employers for accuracy and understanding by the potential employee, allowing evaluations to be completed. VR training allows candidates to go at their own pace, and to repeat a lesson as many times as necessary for them to firmly grasp the concept.

TransfrVR works with their partners to learn what skills and trades they are looking for, and then builds simulations to model those environment and teach those specific skills needed. A digital coach is included in each simulation, introducing the process as the simulation progresses, training the candidate throughout on the steps that need to be taken and how to perform actions, and giving feedback. Simulations have been made to model everything from factories, assembly lines, and hotel front desk receptionists. Certain simulations, like the front desk receptionist, include a microphone so candidates are recorded in how they greet guests and handle situations.

“Through the Gateway Initiative, we’ve learned in South Alabama you’ve got 6.4 million tourists visiting every year, generation $4.4 billion,” Moore said. “You have 50,000 tourism related jobs, and yet only 37% have the required skills. So one of the things we’re excited to be working with you is to be able to help develop the simulation that you need specifically to help your candidates to be able to acquire these skills.”

To learn more about the Gateway Initiative, visit www.southbaldwinchamber.com/gateway.