SBIR Phase I: Learning PM Skills Through "Experience"; Realistic Rehearsal for Project Teams in 3D Virtual Environments.

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project aims to enable users to develop expertise in Project Management in the context of emulated businesses, using 3D Virtual World platforms with the goal of developing expertise through experience with tough problems. Teams of participants interact with virtual replicas of actual processes and products in the context of an ongoing business, with complex goals to accomplish. The environments are enriched with embedded behavior and decision monitoring software designed to automate the tracking of progress and provide feedback. Early pilots have shown unintended success with novice project managers as a way to accelerate learning by as much as two years. The objective for this project is to refine the approach for use with novices with the intention of accelerating the development of expertise in the key skills of project management that are normally learned through years of experience, and specifically, from failure. The project will also resolve a number of questions about the key features at play within emerging Virtual Worlds platforms. "Smart" Virtual Worlds have the potential to provide an optimal opportunity for experiential learning needed for the next generation of project managers facing increasingly complex implementation efforts that require agility and skill sets that go beyond current training methods. The broader/commercial impact of accelerating the rate of developing project management expertise through no-risk experiential learning that is engineered for the development of complex skills in less time is nearly incalculable. Studies of expert project managers indicate that their skill was acquired over many years and as a result of learning by failure. Therefore, even though the value of expert project managers is widely acknowledged, the cost and risk of getting that value is quite high and may simply take too long. Further, the known risks involved in learning through failure prevent other project managers from ever becoming experts. On the other hand, the lack of expertise has costs of its own. Some studies have estimated the organizational losses to upwards of $82 billion annually. These losses are thought to be entirely preventable with better approaches to project management education. Thus far, WTRI is one of the only companies that understands how to build "smart" Virtual Worlds for accelerating expertise Being a leader and early adopter of this emerging technology, we have the potential to lead the industry in the kind of rehearsal and simulation-based techniques that will be increasingly necessary educate professionals to manage complex problems of the future.