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Barminco on
location in London
What does virtual reality, London, recruitment, Barminco and our
value of Excellence have in common?
Well, on 4 September, we brought all of these facets together
when we presented our adoption of a virtual reality tool to some
of the world’s leading talent acquisition leaders. And, after much
research and discussion, we believe this is a world first in terms
of its application in the recruitment process.
This journey started earlier this year, when Barminco identified
an ongoing issue with the retention of employees in our
underground workforce.
These team members - primarily working in entry level positions
such as truck drivers and nippers - were resigning after one or
two swings following their employment and first experience of
working underground. While a number of reasons were given,
one of the most frequent was that people were not cut out to
work underground.
And so, as we are obviously unable to send potential employees
for a site visit prior to hiring them, we decided another way
was needed to provide applicants with a realistic experience of
the underground environment during the recruitment process.
Our focus was to get more people to opt out of the recruitment
process when they realised it wasn’t for them, rather than
getting to site and then resigning
Partnering with our truck simulation provider Immersive
Technologies, Barminco HSE&T and the Resourcing Team
subsequently developed a low cost, portable virtual reality
simulation to enable potential candidates who had never
been underground to experience what it’s like during the
interview process.
The simulation allows an individual to be a passenger in a LV
which enters the portal and during the following three minutes,
participants gain a basic introduction to an underground mine,
with an interactive component of completing a SWICK.
The experience was shared with a number of experienced
Barminco employees who have said the experience was as
close as you can get to being underground. And the good news
is that clients and regulators have also seen the technology,
reinforcing Barminco as an innovator in the sector.
This innovative solution was subsequently noticed by a UK
based event organiser - Trumunity - and Barminco was invited
to present at #TruLondon which was attended by more than
150 of the world’s leading talent acquisition and thought leaders.
The feedback was overwhelmingly positive, particularly as no
Events
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Stan Rolfe