A surprising amount of learning is done on the job. Whether a new graduate sitting in their first office, or a bricklayer on their first building site, often it is in the ‘doing’ that real skills grow.
Apprenticeships are an old phenomenon, and a tried and tested one. From medieval guilds where select artisans mastered a craft or trade, to today’s formal traineeships for on-the-job learning or even the informal advice from a mentor to mentee, their success makes clear that learning is not only about education.
It is often the little things, the nuances of how to behave in a meeting, how to navigate workplace politics, the way in which business units fit together or what skills are most prized, that are not written down and learnt only by observation, conversation and practice in the workplace.
What happens then, in a virtual world, where there is no ‘workplace’?
The virtual helping hand
Apprenticeships provide learners with the skills they need for long-term success, and they also serve “as a process to launch this talent into a career pathway that enables them to optimise their skills in the context of ever-emerging new technologies and career opportunities.”1 They are critical to a healthy, productive workplace culture.
And it turns out, there’s a virtual example of them that’s been succeeding at this for years.
Anyone who spends time playing Minecraft, Roblox, or Animal Crossing, or, passing endless levels of Candy Crush, Tetris or Angry Birds on their smartphone while waiting for a bus will likely be familiar with the concept, if not the name, of the ‘walkthrough’. These videos, also called ‘Let’s Plays,’ assist players when they have trouble in games — be it a tricky section they can’t seem to pass or mastering an entire game.
Essentially, walkthroughs are simply videos of gamers playing games. These players point out hidden treasure, provide tactics for beating tricky foes or levels and provide often humorous, straight-forward commentary. And while watching someone else play a game may seem tedious in the extreme to the uninitiated, the style is popular —really popular — often racking up millions of views per video.2
Well curated, engaging series not only show those watching how to complete games, they provide content around which a community can skill and incubate new creators. This path to the ‘creator economy’ mentors through well curated stories and walkthroughs, reflects and supports learners with their own work and creates a space for exploration where participants can generate their own content and communities in turn.
And it’s the perfect model for transitioning the way we train people in the workplace to a virtual or hybrid workplace model.
Let’s look at a few of the core elements that make it work.
Engaging mentors
Mentoring is more than a ‘step-by-step’ guide. Sharing behaviours and explaining experiences ‘in person’ are necessary for holistic learning. When content is delivered virtually, often the hands-on experiences and behind-the-scenes stories are missing, and the nuance of a learning situation is not brought to life. This is what gaming walkthroughs do so well.
Unlike workplace training, teacher-creators are constantly forced to create superior products as they fight for attention. It’s a crowded market, and to succeed videos have to be informative, entertaining or even reactionary, to attract viewers to a channel.3 As a result of this competition, content is often well-edited and thoroughly planned. Creators learn and leverage skills more akin to the entertainment industry, producing sophisticated, multi-episode content that allows for long-form storytelling.
Additionally, a strong gaming walkthrough mentor is personable, engaging, and fallible. Learners are looking for guidance as well as ‘the right way’ to do something. They want to see themselves in the hosts; their fallibility gives learners hope that they too, will one day be able to master a skill or game.
Community reflection and support
Similar to traditional apprenticeship and social learning programs, the communities around gaming walkthroughs encourage learners to practice skills and actively support each other's work. These types of communities are similar to more formal learning methods, where members are grouped in “small learning pods so they may train and tackle tasks together.”4
The mentor and the content is always there to refer to, but is only the catalyst for learning. Gaming communities on Twitch, Youtube, Discord and elsewhere provide learners a place to take the modeled behaviour, and engage in peer-to-peer learning. Learners at all levels of capability start engaging and supporting each other, allowing context and experience to come from different places.
Communities provide additional situational context that might not be covered in the walkthrough and provide learners with real hands-on support. Many tackle games together, working online to beat challenges. They provide each other with the resources needed to develop themselves in the game as well as celebrating and commiserating together. For these communities, being a member means actively supporting others in their endeavors.
Exploration, branding and opportunities
Traditional professional development aims to provide progression within an employee’s role and skills. Online creator economy communities provide additional opportunities, such as growing their brand and network.
Content creators are more likely to succeed when they can focus on a niche topic and demographic, because they typically end up with a more targeted audience and stronger product.5 In the walkthrough space, creator communities allow other content creators to grow, and due to the way in which they learn — together — provide established audiences for them to advertise their skills/content to.
For many, learners convert from consumers to creators of their own content and communities. Newly skilled gamers build their brands by teaching others about something they’re passionate about, in the same way their mentors did. Without a physical office space to be ‘seen’ in, building one’s brand in a hybrid or virtual environment is of course much less organic and the way in which creator communities operate is perhaps a good model to emulate.
Some businesses are already trying this out. PwC Central and Eastern Europe for instance, is incentivising employees to create their own mini-trainings on topics they are passionate about and to leverage peer-to-peer coaching and mentoring schemes that stimulate a growth mindset and a sense of accountability for a learner’s development. PwC Australia has built a ‘digital’ creator community where employees can create digital solutions and share them with the wider firm for use in their own work.
See, play, assist
The gaming community has perfected a model that empowers and connects learners, creates opportunities to pursue passions and grow skills — and to give back to a community that will in turn teach others. As one creator shared, “there’s nothing I’ve done that anybody else can’t do. It’s about learning [..] and creating. All you have to do is start.”6 And they’ve done all of it virtually.
As workplaces move towards hybrid models of work and the at-home flexibility that employees gained during the COVID-19 pandemic becomes not only standard, but a competitive advantage when recruiting the top talent, businesses have to ensure that the nuances of office-based learning aren’t lost. Virtual apprenticeships provide a tried, true and tested way of doing so.
