'If you can reduce the cost of getting that employee up to speed, then you're going to be more successful as an organization'
While the food services industry continues to struggle filling job openings, one expert claims that turning to training using artificial intelligence could help employers.
It all boils down to virtual simulations, says Daniel Hawes, vice president of product design at Givex, a platform that integrates gift and loyalty programs, point of sale systems, and flexible payment services.
“If I can put you as an employee in a situation in advance, and ideally even repeat that situation many times, then when you do experience that, you're going to be much more confident and much more self-aware in that experience,” Hawes told HRD Canada.
This can be done through fully immersive simulations with augmented reality “where you overlay certain things within an environment and challenge people with questions,” he says.
With employers continuing to have a hard time filling job openings, one employer is using artificial intelligence to upskill workers and keep them on board.
Advantages of AI-based training
With the use of AI, employers can create an individual, personalized learning experience for each worker, says Hawes. And that’s a big advantage, he says.
That’s because “you're going to engage more actively if you like [what] you're engaging with, and it's comfortable and it's something that's relevant to you. Then it is going to be more effective.”
AI-based training also allows workers to learn from failure faster, which is good for speeding up the onboarding process, says Hawes.
“The problem sometimes with training [in the restaurant setup] is an employee can make a mistake in the context of the learning environment, and they don't find out until about a week or a week later. Or they've made that mistake 25 times and then somebody catches them,” he says.
“In a simulation of this, you can catch that and there's real-time feedback. So that's going to reduce the training time. It's going to allow them to make mistakes and fail sooner, and get corrected. And as a result, you're going to have faster onboarding.
“If you can reduce the cost of getting that employee up to speed, then you're going to be more successful as an organization.”
Earlier this year, multinational TD Bank Group launched a TD Co-op/Intern VR pilot for early talent groups in the metaverse.
Measuring the success of AI-based training
But how can employers measure the success of the training if it’s done in a virtual space?
“You really need to understand where the individuals are in their process. And then you have to decide on performance benchmarks of some sort: So what is it that you want to achieve?” says Hawes.
“You start with pre-training, performance benchmarks, and then when you simulate the performance and come up with an assessment that’s tailored for the particular worker.”
Employers must also not overlook the importance of rote memorization in this scenario, he says.
He admits that people dismiss rote learning because “it's but just their ability to retain knowledge”. However, if you have information at their fingertips, “it'll make you seem smarter, and able to serve the customer better”.
Exercises and gamified learning opportunities can help workers with this, he says.
This year, workers “are going to be putting more pressure on their current employer to develop them,” one expert previously told HRD.
Challenges to training in AI
However, there may be some challenges to AI-based training, says Hawes.
“You may, in the real world, face experiences that you haven't [prepared] for in training… So that could provide challenges. Depending on the quality of your training environment, you may not have full contextual understanding.”
But training with the use of AI is just part of the process, and not the entire process on itself, he says.
“You have to combine it with real life experience. You're not going to learn everything in AI. AI will take you to a certain point; it'll get you over some humps. But then you got to get into the real world and experience it.”
