TeamViewer Survey: Augmented Reality Drives Better Frontline Employee Onboarding Amid Tight Labor Market

A research project initiated by TeamViewer, a leading global provider of remote connectivity and workplace digitalization solutions, found that 67% of onboarding leaders say the current labor market has made onboarding more difficult, and 86% of companies using augmented reality (AR) technology (like smart glasses) for onboarding say this technology has improved the quality of their training.

According to a survey of 300 U.S. onboarding and training leaders across a range of industries, organizations are looking to increase the productivity of new and existing workers with smarter onboarding and training technologies. Seventy-one percent of respondents say their organization would benefit from onboarding employees more quickly, but only 25% are sure they can do that.

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“Augmented Reality technology has emerged as a multi-purpose tool for improving training and onboarding, while also increasing productivity and reducing worker error,” said Patricia Nagle, President, TeamViewer Americas. “AR helps unlock the full potential of the industrial metaverse for frontline workers by displaying real-time data from backend systems, interactive and immersive training workflows, and providing hands-free step-by-step instructions as they train for and perform their jobs. During a tight labor market, optimizing your onboarding, training, and workflows has never been more crucial.”

More than half (53%) of onboarding leaders said that frontline workers are harder to train than professional/managerial workers for a variety of reasons, including that they are often face-to-face with customers, have less experience, and often have to act instantly and with more precision across a wider range of responsibilities. Organizations have already begun adapting to compensate for these challenges. Onboarding leaders reported that over the last 12 months, the onboarding process has changed to include more videos, adjusted onboarding periods, easier onboarding expectations, more interactive quizzes, and inspirational messages from company leaders.

Companies adopting AR are becoming more competitive: Sixty-seven percent of onboarding leaders who train with augmented reality said that this approach is becoming a key competitive advantage, and companies that train using the technology are twice as likely to say they have an effective onboarding process. The training outcomes for organizations using AR technology were clear. Respondents have improved training results by 50%, decreased worker error by 49%, and increased customer satisfaction by 56%.

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Hitting onboarding goals: Companies that train with AR are 2.5x more likely to consistently hit their onboarding goals, with the primary benefits being observed in compliance, progress tracking, error reduction, employee experience, and employee memory retention. Given this array of benefits, other leaders are beginning to take notice. Sixty-two percent of organizations plan to increase spending on technology that supports frontline workers in 2023.

Productivity gains: Eighty percent of onboarding leaders expect frontline employee productivity to increase in 2023 due to new technology. The top gains that onboarding leaders expect to see due to the use of new technology for frontline workers next year include higher employee retention, faster training, fewer errors, and more new hires.

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