Could the metaverse take hybrid work to the next level?

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Many HR professionals will be focusing on getting hybrid working right, but could the future of work lie in the metaverse? Jo Faragher looks at how increasingly layered virtual workspaces will impact everything from learning to diversity and inclusion.
For many people, the concept of the ‘metaverse’ conjures up a virtual world filled with clunky digital avatars floating aimlessly between different realities. A video showing how supermarket giant Walmart envisioned its customers shopping in the metaverse recently prompted hilarity on social media, with one viewer claiming he’d rather “poke out his eyeballs” than buy wine from an awkward-looking digital ‘employee’.
But despite this scepticism, a growing number of businesses are looking into how the metaverse – a term originally coined in Neal Stephenson’s sci-fi novel Snow Crash in 1992 – could enhance how employees work together, particularly as work arrangements become more hybrid thanks to the pandemic.
Its proponents argue it will transform how we train employees, foster closer collaboration regardless of location, and reduce carbon footprint because we can be with each other virtually rather than flying across the world.

Ecosystem

Not surprisingly, there was much media fanfare surrounding Facebook’s name change to Meta in 2021 – staking its claim to where it sees the direction of its future business – but the metaverse will be owned and populated by a whole ecosystem of developers.

“Facebook, of course, chose to rename their entire company to