Interview: Encouraging empathy through VR

Sion:  So, here’s one for you. Can you imagine being in someone else’s shoes and experiencing life through their eyes? Alex Tavassoli, the founderGründer(in)founder of enliven sth.etw. belebenEnliven Empathy, a Dutch company specializing in virtual-reality or VR experiences, spoke to Business Spotlight about the power of VR to increase empathy in the workplace. 

The idea is that a team experiences a situation through a VR headset. After this, they have conversations about the experience. This can lead to real change in company culture. His VR experiences cover scenarios like bullyingMobbingbullying, sexual harassmentBelästigungharassment, exclusionAusgrenzungexclusion, idea theftDiebstahltheft and gender biasgeschlechtsspezifische Voreingenommenheit/ Diskriminierunggender bias. Firstly, Alex gave us an example of one experience that his company offers to increase awareness of sexism.

Alex: We have a solution for workplace cultural transformation. And there, you have to imagine, for instance, men experience what it’s like to be a woman in the workplace. They go through situations that women face sth.etw. gegenüberstehenface, but it opens up a wider conversation around acts of exclusion in the workplace, forms of bias, harmful behaviour, and it leads to a lot of vulnerableverletzlichvulnerable sharing from all groups of the company. 

Sion: He then explained the positive impactAuswirkung(en)impact his VR experiences can have.

Alex: And it leads to these beautiful conversations. At least to: “Yes, we understand that we have a problem. What can I do to be a part of the solution?” And then, we equip sb. with sth.jmdn. mit etw. ausstattenequip them with simple strategies to step in when colleagues experience harmful behaviour.

Sion: Finally, Alex spoke about how all sectors would benefit from increased empathy at work. 

Alex: Everyone needs this cultural shifthier: Wandelshift of unspoken issueProblem, Frageissues. What we see in our work with organizations is independent of the sector. There’s a gapKluftgap of where they are today in terms of culture and where they want to be in the future, and typically, that’s around empathy, communication, having vulnerable stories shared and conversations held within teams.