How will the metaverse be applied at work

The last two years were marked by digitization in communications like never before. And that reality left a mark that is perceived in different environments, including work. Apparently, many workers are not willing to give up the benefits they have gained with virtuality.

According to Microsoft's “Labor Trends Index” report, 52% of employees consider transitioning to a model hybrid or remote in its current role over the next year. The report comes from an external study of 31,000 people in 31 countries including Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico.

In this context where people are prioritizing digitization, 54% of decision makers within companies (directors and managers) say that next year they will focus their efforts on redesigning meeting rooms to be more user-friendly hybrid work. This means that they will invest in more technology and support to sustain a model where virtuality says present.

When reading these trends, one cannot help but think that the metaverse begins to appear strongly as an environment of interaction where virtual and augmented reality will seek to enhance, among other things, remote and hybrid work. The report makes it clear that employees do not want to leave the home office completely behind.

In fact, 51% of all hybrid workers surveyed said they consider a complete switch to remote in the next year. The index even reached 58% in Latin America. But working remotely or in a hybrid way doesn't mean without schedules.

“Overall, after two years, the time spent on weekly meetings for the average Teams user increased by 252%, while chats sent per person each week increased by 32%, and the number continues to grow. Although the length of the working day rose by 46 minutes, work outside working hours and on weekends increased by 28 per cent and 14 per cent, respectively,” the report highlights.

When it comes to hybrid workers, the biggest challenge is understanding when and why to go to the office. However, globally, only 28% of leaders managed to agree with their team on these standards.

Metaverse at work

In this context, where workers and some employers seek to optimize the benefits of remote or hybrid work, technology plays a key role.

In this regard, it has been seen that several technology companies have started to bet on solutions that seek to optimize digital interaction in such a way that it is more “realistic”.

This is the case of Mesh, a form of communication that includes holograms and virtual reality to interact with users in different parts of the world. The first edition of this metaverse solution was developed for Teams and will be available later this year.

The platform allows people in different physical locations to join collaborative and shared holographic experiences through virtual meetings, chats, etc.

Zuckerberg, for his part, has already anticipated that the metaverse will have various applications in the workplace, precisely because the world has migrated to an increasingly digital context. Thus, the possibility of merging the real and virtual environment seeks to optimize communication so that distance in time and space is not a barrier.

It must be understood that the metaverse is not limited to just one company or one type of product: it refers to all the solutions that, integrating different forms of virtual reality , increased or mixed, favor communication and interaction between people in different parts of the world.

Understood in this way, and seeing how labor and other ties are shaped in this new post-pandemic world, it is not unreasonable to say that the metaverse is here to stay.

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