Culture

Is your organization ready to embrace MetaVerse?

It is no secret that the global economy is changing. The internet has given rise to new industries, disrupted old ones, and increased economic opportunities for small businesses. People want to share their lives with others in real life and virtual reality. 

They have changed to accommodate people who live their lives online and offline.

With Metaverse becoming a reality and hybrid culture is here to stay, organizations need to prepare better to augment the physical world in the Metaverse, keeping the culture in mind. 

Recently Bill Gates, predicted our work meetings would move to Metaverse in 2-3 years.

Building a business case for Metaverse within your organization

To ensure that your Metaverse is a reality, you will need to create a business case for Metaverse within your organization.

Metaverse is a digital representation of physical space. It could be used as a destination to meet up with friends and family, explore new places, and gather information.

Metaverse can be structured to resemble physical locations and objects and augmented with digital content such as pictures, videos, and text. Metaverse requires an internet connection, but it can be accessed anywhere in the world at any given time – which is perfect for those who travel extensively for work or pleasure. Metaverse can even be accessed using Virtual Reality (VR) devices. Metaverse is the foundation for a Metaverse economy, where commerce can occur, skills could be exchanged, and experiences shared between users/customers.

To successfully build your Metaverse business case, you will need to analyze how Metaverse will affect customer behavior if it were to exist or how employees engage and integrate with creating a better customer experience. Customers are already interested in Metaverses – they use social media platforms, where content is posted online for their friends to view.

Metaverses break down barriers of physical distance, allowing everyone to communicate with each other easily through digital means across any location and time zone. Metaverses also empower small businesses and entrepreneurs by leveling the playing field against more giant corporations since all Metaverses require an internet connection and a Metaverse-enabled computer device. Metaverses have the power to transform traditional businesses into new, digital business models that are more relevant for this day and age.

An example of a Metaverse-enabled business is Second Life. In Second Life, users create their character, which people choose – either as cartoonish or realistic-looking avatars and interact with each other in a 3D virtual world where they share ideas, buy/sell products from one another or pay to access areas on the Metaverse such as nightclubs and shopping centers. If Metaverses become more mainstream, this would allow businesses to reach new customers and provide them with novel means of conducting business.

Perhaps Metaverse will be the platform that enables everyone to achieve their goals in life.

The business case for Metaverse needs to be convincing enough to get management on board with the idea of allocating resources – whether it be financial, human, or technological – towards developing this new platform. In addition, management will need to see how Metaverse can improve customer and employee experience and increase revenue streams.

Creating a culture that embraces Metaverse

Once you have created your business case for Metaverse, you will need to create a culture that embraces Metaverse. This means that everyone in your organization must buy into the idea and be willing to work together to make it a reality.

Metaverse must be a collaborative effort between your organization and customers to succeed.

Metaverse can even affect product creation. For Metaverses to become mainstream, they will need more than just casual users – organizations need to build communities around Metaverses by creating content on Metaverses themselves that their target audience wants.

Metaverses are all about sharing information and experiences with other people in real-time or asynchronous times - a concept referred to as hybrid reality. For example, educational institutions have used metaverses through virtual lectures where students could participate remotely via Metaverses while also seeing the professor and classmates in the Metaverse.

For organizations to prepare for Metaverse, they need first to assess their current culture. Metaverse can improve customer experience, but it can also be used to disrupt how your organization conducts business. Management will need to be on board with the idea of change. Otherwise, Metaverse will not be successful.

All employees must be aware of Metaverse and improve its operations. Metaverse is a new platform that can completely change how people interact online and offline.

Metaverse can allow organizations to reach new customers and provide them with novel business means. Metaverse works depend on what you want to do with them. For example, Metaverses can be used for socializing or simply exploring different worlds without interacting with other users while in Metaverses.

Metaverse transforms people's lives, work, and play by connecting the real-world physical with digital space. Metaverse is an online world where you can buy physical products with virtual cash, chat with friends via avatar, share thoughts on blogs or social networks or run your own business. Metaverse is another platform where you can consume content and create content. Metaverse is a new reality or Meta Reality.

Now that Metaverse is ready for prime time, organizations must be prepared to fit their culture into this new Metaverse reality. Here are some tips on how to do so:

  1. Understand the Metaverse culture – What is the Metaverse culture? What are the norms and values? How do people communicate and behave? What is etiquette? Etc. Metaverse will have its own set of cultural norms that need to be understood to conduct business within it properly.

  2. Adapt your company's culture – If your culture does not fit the Metaverse culture, adapt it to work. This may require some changes in how your company operates. For example, if your company is hierarchical and Metaverse is more egalitarian, you must adjust.

  3. Train your employees – Employees unfamiliar with Metaverse culture may not conduct business within it properly. Therefore, it is essential to train them on the proper etiquette and behavior so that they do not inadvertently offend someone or damage the company's reputation.

  4. Create a strategic plan – Metaverse is still evolving rapidly in its early stages. Therefore, it is essential to have a strategic plan in place so that your organization can adapt as needed. The plan should include how the company plans to use Metaverse, the Metaverse strategy, and what resources need to be allocated to the Metaverse initiative.

  5. Prepare for new opportunities – Metaverse is a new way of living that will change how people play, work, and interact with others. It opens up a whole realm of new business opportunities where companies can create Metaverse-specific products or tailor existing ones to fit Metaverse needs. This represents a new market segment ripe with possibilities for businesses willing to try it out.

Metaverse is still in its early stages and evolving rapidly, so it has a strategic plan to adapt as needed. Nevertheless, the Metaverse is the next step in the evolution of the internet.

Impact of Metaverse on organizations not ready

As the Metaverse continues to evolve, more and more organizations are preparing for the inevitable impact that it will have on their business. However, many companies are still not ready for the Metaverse, and they may be in for a rude awakening.

The Metaverse is a virtual world built on top of the internet. It allows people to connect with others in a virtual environment, and it is growing in popularity. The Metaverse offers many business opportunities, but it can also be disruptive.

The Metaverse is already starting to impact businesses, and it will only become more prevalent in the future. Companies that are not prepared for the Metaverse will find themselves at a disadvantage against competitors.

Metaverse is essential to business. The Metaverse is not something that companies can afford to ignore. Experts believe that the Metaverse will eventually become as popular as social networks like Facebook and Twitter, with significant implications for businesses. The Metaverse offers the potential for more direct interactions with customers. Still, it also gives companies a way to bring their products and services directly to people in a virtual environment.

Companies need to be ready for the Metaverse to avoid getting left behind as it expands and becomes more popular. Metaverse is vital for business, but organizations must prepare themselves before fully taking advantage of it.

The Metaverse is not just about gaming and entertainment. People are already using Metaverse to connect, share information, conduct business, and more. In addition, the Metaverse offers people the chance to communicate in different ways than they can in the real world, which has led to some interesting cultural changes.

People who spend much time in the Metaverse tend to be even more isolated from their physical lives than some internet users today. This disconnection from society has created a unique Metaverse culture that does not exist anywhere else.

People in the Metaverse have some characteristics that make them stand out from other online communities:

  1. Inclusiveness - Metaverse users are very friendly, and they often want to help others learn about Metaverse.

  2. Sociability - Metaverse is used for social interaction almost as much as for entertainment purposes. Metaverse users frequently connect to create new friendships or strengthen old ones.

  3. Competition - Metaverse is similar to physical games in some ways because people use it for playing games. Still, Metaverse also offers many opportunities for competition with others in the Metaverse community.

  4. Privacy concerns - Metaversians tend to be more private than their real-life counterparts because all interactions take place online, where nothing can be hidden from strangers who share the same cyber world with them.

  5. Metaversians can create different virtual identities, allowing them to express themselves in ways that would be impossible in the real world.

  6. Metaversians tend to be more creative than people who do not spend much time in Metaverse.

Metaverse brings about several other cultural changes. However, many Metaversians relate very closely with their online counterparts and make a point to look out for each other to ensure their safety while sharing information or conducting business together.

If your organization is unprepared for Metaverse, you risk alienating customers and employees. By understanding the culture and preparing your company's culture for Metaverse, you will capitalize on this exciting new technology.

Power Series: Observation (a key learning principle in 2020 and beyond)

I am a father of two great boys. Being with them and see them grow has been one of the most rewarding experiences for me. Over the last decade seeing my elder one grow and adopt skills has made me go back to a fundamental question - how do kids learn things which we didn’t intend them to learn or have taught them? I am sure you are aware of what I am talking about and surprises or laughs or moments we all have experienced as parents. Observing them and listening to them has taught me a lot, and I have embraced this concept further in the last five years of my personal and professional experience.

I have shared earlier that my work takes me to places and often to areas and situations which I haven’t experienced before. This brings in areas of learning which I have been imbibing on by merely observing. Observational learning has been an age-old practice where a lot of scholars have researched and written about it. Today I see it fading or not getting much attention apart from science experiments or sports in the age of AI. We are relying on technology to do the observation and then learn from it rather than imbibing it wholly in our day-to-day. The world is evolving at a rapid speed, and just reading or listening would not teach us enough to be successful in the present and prepare for the future.

There are four primary stages of observational learning: a) Attention, b) Retention/Memory, c) Motor/Practice, and finally d) Motivation.

Observation_2.jpg


Just observing doesn’t help, actual replication or practice would improve the learning to be more profound. Since I land up in new places, you mustn’t get alienated or be looked upon as out of place. My practice on observational learning is focussed on the following areas

  1. Communication structures: Whether it is a new city, country, restaurant, or professional setup, you can learn about the cultural nuances and communication structures just by observing people, the things kept, or what drives or motivates or make individuals happy. More so within a professional setup, whether in a meeting, conference calls, or the broader organization on how the office setup is, or calls/meetings get conducted, who sits where, how does the communication flow define the organization culture. In my current role, it is critical to understand the organization, so observational learning helps me to work with my customers and the broader organization better.

  2. Organization Structures: Leading a substantial sales and consultancy organization requires one to coach and lead the team to analyze and understand how to do the budget, decisions, and information flows within an organization. It can be achieved by just observing the organization structures, how does the email communication flow, and, more importantly, asking the critical questions enable to decipher the culture of the organization.

  3. Technology Knowledge: Technology is evolving at a rapid rate, and there are increased technology proliferation and quite a bit of similar feature sets across different products. Observational learning plays a more significant role today in the age of Technology as it allows me personally to grasp what need does the platform addresses and similar or dissimilar functions between the two sets of technologies belonging to the same category.

No one can call themselves an observational learning expert. It is more of experiential learning as well, and the more you get exposed to that area of interest and observe with practice over a while would help you to be a more natural observational learner.

If you practice this type in areas that I haven’t mentioned, then I would love to hear about it. Chao..