Case Study: Hybrid Onboarding | Rohde & Schwarz with rooom

02/17/2025

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Hybrid onboarding in the Metaverse: Rohde & Schwarz shows how technology makes global onboarding interactive, scalable and sustainable.

The workplace is undergoing fundamental change. New work and hybrid job models are shaping everyday life in many companies. Rohde & Schwarz is also a globally active group. This goes hand in hand with new challenges, particularly in the area of onboarding: How can new employees be integrated worldwide? How can the corporate culture be communicated when long distances make face-to-face meetings a challenge? Innovative concepts and platforms that combine technology and flexibility are needed to answer these questions. The electronics group Rohde & Schwarz (R&S) shows how a modern onboarding program can meet these requirements.

The challenge: Making onboarding processes attractive and interactive, even remotely and at smaller international locations
The goal: Develop a scalable and hybrid onboarding solution for a global target group
The implementation: Creating an immersive corporate world with rooom and hosting regular onboarding days
The result: Increased employee satisfaction and more successfully completed onboardings worldwide

Global onboarding strategy for a diverse target group

The corporate onboarding team at Rohde & Schwarz was faced with the challenge of designing a global onboarding journey aimed at a heterogeneous target group: Students, employees and managers from all over the world. With 700 to 1,000 new employees every year and a network of 14,000 employees worldwide, existing solutions had to be adapted. In particular, remote workers and those at smaller international locations without their own HR teams needed to be better integrated.

The goal was clear: a hybrid onboarding process that conveys corporate culture, technology and purpose. This should strengthen employee loyalty and work both on-site at the Munich headquarters and remotely. “We want to motivate new team members and enable them to act as brand ambassadors. Interaction was particularly important to us,” say Birgit Riepl and Simone Heinrich from the R&S Corporate Onboarding Team. To achieve this, they worked with smart learning specialist Dr. Sirkka Freigang, who used her expertise to make the learning concept particularly “smart”.

Smart learning and onboarding in the Metaverse - what is it?

Onboarding is considered smart in the context of smart learning when personalized, interactive and technology-supported learning methods are used during an induction. This includes, for example:

Customized content based on individual needs
Active learning through simulations, quizzes and gamification
Learning modules for flexible learning at your own pace
Use of technologies such as AI, AR or VR to intensify the experience
Continuous feedback and materials accessible at any time

In this concept, we understand the metaverse as virtual spaces and environments that build a corporate world for knowledge transfer and exchange. In this way, a particularly effective and motivating learning environment can be created for the training of new employees. This corporate world can also be used for recruiting purposes as well as training and further education.

Hybrid onboarding experiences with rooom

Rohde & Schwarz decided to work with the Metaverse provider rooom to develop a browser-based, scalable and interactive platform that includes a new onboarding concept. rooom was chosen because of the following advantages:

Hybrid: Enables a combination of virtual elements and live event.
Device compatibility: No need for special hardware.
Scalability: High numbers of participants possible worldwide.
Self-management: Content can be created without agency costs.
Flexibility: Different modules for different needs.

3D spaces + event platform = perfect combination for onboardings

By combining rooomSpaces and rooomEvents, a platform was created that unites interactive, digital and real onboarding elements.

rooomSpaces: Allows the creation of virtual Metaverse spaces and the integration of avatars and interactive whiteboards.
rooomEvents: The event module supplements the virtual spaces with an intuitive interface with login, menu and special networking features on the day of the event.

Using the rooom Space Editor and the rooomEvents backend, content can be easily created and managed by R&S itself - without expensive agencies or coding effort.

3D Space Editor Screenshot — The corporate onboarding team can set up virtual spaces with the 3D Space Editor.

A new approach to onboarding

And so the project team began with the design and implementation. After an intensive analysis of the needs of R&S, a platform was set up that plays a key role in the onboarding of new team members.

The onboarding journey consists of several stages:

Be ready: Welcome boxes, the onboarding navigation map and onboarding guides provide an initial overview of administrative and organizational topics in expert calls.
Be inspired: Immersive product experiences and insights into the corporate culture not only provide orientation, but also inspiration.
Be empowered: A global onboarding day as a central event that combines cross-location networking, peer learning and social learning.

Especially for the second and third stage, the Metaverse platform is essential for participants to receive information and exchange ideas regardless of their location. Under the motto “Be the next Diamond”, the global onboarding day takes place every three months on the rooom platform. The content is also available there on a long-term basis after the event.

And this is how the onboarding in the Metaverse looks like: The day begins with access to the platform via the intranet. After logging in, a personal avatar is configured. All participants then start together in the virtual atrium, where an initial introduction and welcome take place. Clickspots take you to various program points and stations that provide important information about the company and everyday working life. The introduction is followed by breakout sessions on the company's values and core technologies, where smaller groups split into different virtual spaces on specific topics, moderated by guides. Tools such as MS Teams and Miro, which play an important role in everyday remote working, were integrated into the platform for this purpose. At the end, all participants come together again in the atrium to evaluate the day and discuss any open questions.

More highlights of the platform:

Realistic atrium: The 3D space is based on original plans of the headquarters in Munich.
Values in action: Social learning format on corporate culture, in particular the corporate values.
Tech map challenge: Interactive tasks to communicate the relevant technology topics and the purpose of R&S.
Video carousel: Enables spontaneous and uncomplicated interaction in speed dating style.
Reflection wall: Collection and exchange of ideas and learning outcomes with virtual sticky notes.

“rooom allows us not only to share content with employees, but also to enable interactive learning.”
- Simone Heinrich, Project Lead Smart Learning Journey at Rohde & Schwarz

Measurable success and positive feedback

The platform has not only increased the number of onboardings worldwide, but has also boosted participant satisfaction. Younger generations in particular praised the modern technology and interactive formats. Older employees needed more support with orientation, but also coped well.

Thanks to the measurable scaling, international locations can be integrated on an equal footing and employees can experience R&S products in an explorative way using 3D models and AR, while feedback is regularly obtained and used for optimization.

And the globally scalable onboarding journey has even won an award: receiving the HR Excellence Award 2024 in the onboarding category highlights the success of the project.

HR Excellence Award 2024 for R&S Metaverse — The HR Excellence Award recognizes outstanding achievements that are characterized by innovation, strategic vision and effective implementation.

Is your organization ready for the future?

Grow your business - whether it's employer branding, onboarding or training. Create your virtual corporate world with rooom!

Challenges and perspectives

The platform and virtual spaces were designed to be user-friendly and appealing, with optimized performance and loading times. A sophisticated testing process helped to identify errors at an early stage and resolve potential firewall problems, for example. Although the Metaverse was new to many employees, they were successfully familiarized with the new topic. And the onboarding duration of 6 hours in total was also made more enjoyable thanks to well-structured breaks and interactive elements. The integration of future technologies such as AI learning assistants and a social wall for collaborative work are already planned. The matchmaking feature is also set to be used even more intensively in future, for example to make it easier to arrange lunch dates together.

With the smart learning onboarding journey, Rohde & Schwarz has created a pioneering solution that effectively integrates global employees and brings the corporate culture to life worldwide. The collaboration with rooom shows how modern technology can support innovative HR processes.

The 3D Space Viewer provides an insight into the R&S corporate Metaverse:

Click on the button to open the virtual space - try it out!

About Rohde & Schwarz

The global technology group headquartered in Munich is actively shaping cutting-edge technologies such as AI, 6G, cloud and quantum technology. The product portfolio includes measurement technology, security scanners, communication systems and high-frequency electronics.

Rohde & Schwarz embodies innovation and progress since more than 90 years. The company acts as an independent and reliable partner for customers from industry, public authorities and the sovereign sector.

Visit R&S website