As a leader, how can you prepare for high-stakes high-pressure conversations in a safe environment?
Corporate DNA Consulting, a global leadership firm with expertise in performance psychology partnered with immersive technology consultants Somewhere Else to explore how virtual reality could be used to improve situational leadership and conflict management of managers within a workplace.
Somewhere Else had previously asked us to develop BodySwaps – The Susan Project. Due to it’s success and our design and technical expertise, they asked us to be the delivery partner for this innovative experience.
In BodySwaps – The David Project, we opted for a role-playing format, which recreates a performance review meeting between David, an employee with a less-than perfect HR record and a manager.
The experience lets the user embody both sides of the situation. It starts by letting you listen and respond to David using your own words, before stepping into his shoes and listening back to what you have said from his perspective. It allows one to understand and adapt communication skills, build self awareness and improve behaviour.
Bodyswaps – The David Project is one of many BodySwaps projects being worked on. It is app data-driven, allowing us to easily interchange environments, characters and scripts dependent on the clients’ needs.
The user interacts with this Unity experience through movement, using Oculus Rift controllers as well as through voice with inbuilt microphones. This was used to drive their avatar’s body and facial movements automatically.
As in BodySwaps – The Susan Project, characters in this experience were created using an off-the-shelf avatar design package. Also, the voices were performed by professional actors and later animated using our own AI to mix together motion-captured data for the body (captured using the Perception Neuron performance capture system). This was done with user input that responds to eye contact, emotion and interjections during speech.
Lastly, we integrated Google’s Natural Language and Beyond Verbal’s Speech APIs to provide the user a detailed scorecard of their performance. This takes into account semantic data of their response, attention and even tone of voice.
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