Episode 44

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Published on:

26th Oct 2021

Using VR for Good: Reducing Bias & Improving DEI with Dr. Robin Rosenberg #44

Nick Day is joined on The HR L&D Podcast sofa by Dr. Robin Rosenberg is the CEO and Founder of liveintheirworld.com and she is a clinical psychologist and textbook author who has had both psychotherapy and executive coaching practices in the San Francisco Bay Area and New York City. She is also author of the best-selling book, The Psychology of Superheroes

Robin is board certified in clinical psychology and is an Assistant Clinical Professor at the University of California in San Francisco and she is also the author of a number of psychology books including Superhero Origins: What Makes Superheroes Tick and Why We Care.

Robin has been interested in virtual reality (VR) for years, and was the lead author of a study to investigate using “VR for good.” She has combined her interest in immersive technologies with her coaching and clinical experiences to foster in employees a deeper understanding of how and why other people may feel slighted or marginalized, and how to approach such interactions differently.

After decades with successful psychotherapy and coaching practices, Robin founded Live in Their World, which combines the science of psychology and emotional and cognitive learning, with immersive virtual reality and online learning and Live in Their World is committed to addressing incivility and demographic-based bias, such as that related to race/ethnicity and gender, to help create workplaces that are more respectful for all.

In this “Using VR for Good: Reducing Bias and Improving DEI” episode with Dr. Robin Rosenberg on The HR L&D Podcast, we also explore:

  1. What got you interested in exploring bias, diversity, equality, and inclusion (DEI)?
  2. How does your background as a psychologist influence the work you are doing with Live in Their World?
  3. Can you tell me more about bias & discrimination and what can be done by businesses to overcome it?
  4. Live in Their World utilises virtual reality as part of its program, especially as it can be used to help understand bias – can you tell us more about this?
  5. You have also written a book titled The Psychology of Superheroes and a paper titled Virtual Superheroes: Using Superpowers in Virtual Reality to Encourage Prosocial Behaviour. Can you tell us a little more about your motivations behind these and your findings?
  6. What have been some sustaining moments since you founded Live in Their World?
  7. What was the impact of COVID-19 on your business?
  8. Do you think remote work will remain feasible after the pandemic is over?
  9. What are likely to be the most challenging aspects in having a remote or hybrid workforce?

Links highlighted in this “Using VR for Good: Reducing Bias and Improving DEI” episode are included below:

Of course, if you are an HR or L&D Leader listening to this podcast and you have an HR-related vacancy that you would love some specialist human resources recruitment support with – please also get in touch with me!  I would love to help show you what a great HR recruitment experience feels like!  You can reach out to me directly at nick@jgarecruitment.com or give me a call – 01727800377

www.jgarecruitment.com

Thanks for listening folks – I look forward to bringing you the next episode of the HR L&D Podcast real soon!

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About the Podcast

The HR L&D Podcast
Leadership, recruitment, culture. Conversations with HR's best
HR gets handed the problems nobody else wants to own. The restructure, the grievance, the engagement survey that came back badly. And then gets asked why people are leaving.

I'm Nick Day. I run an HR recruitment agency, which means I spend most of my week on the phone to HR directors, HR leaders and people leaders talking about what the job is actually like rather than what's written on the job spec. This HR Podcast came out of those calls. I kept hearing things worth repeating, and nobody was repeating them.

Every week I sit down with HR leaders, chief people officers, L&D specialists and the occasional academic who has changed how I think about work and people engagement. We get into leadership, and what happens when someone brilliant at the technical side gets promoted into managing humans.

Employee engagement past the survey score. Diversity, equity and inclusion in a climate where saying those words out loud has become a decision in itself. Pay transparency, talent management, reducing bias in hiring, HR digital transformation and the HCM systems everyone is being sold. And of course we cannot forget HR AI tools and platforms that are flooding the landscape as AI in HR becomes a hot topic every people leader is keen to understand and leverage.

Wellbeing comes up constantly, and it usually turns into the same question. Who looks after the HR team.

I'm not an HR practitioner and I don't pretend to be. I'm the person who hires them, which puts me in a useful position. I get to ask the obvious question that everyone in the room already knows the answer to and nobody says.

No script and no polite version. Mostly it's the conversation you'd have with someone doing your job at a different company, if you ever got the chance to sit down with them.

If you work in HR, people management or L&D, or you're building a career in it, start by subscribing to The HR L&D Podcast. We have had guests including Stephen Covey, Alan Stein Jnr, Andrea Wareham and Dr. Thom Mayer among other HR Leaders who are shaping the future of work and leadership.

Need HR staff? I run JGA Recruitment, an HR and payroll recruitment agency. www.jgarecruitment.com or info@jgarecruitment.com

Want to be on the show? Nick@jgadigital.com

If payroll is closer to your world, I also host The Payroll Podcast, the most listened to payroll show in the world.

Topics include HR leadership, workplace culture, retention, people management, employee engagement, diversity, equity and inclusion, DEI strategy, AI for HR, AI recruitment tools, talent management, HR digital transformation, HCM, staff wellbeing, pay transparency, reducing bias, L&D and HR recruitment.

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Nick Day