Harvard’s Mt. Everest Virtual Simulation Workshop Provides Unique Team Training Skills
Hosted on the Harvard Business Publishing Education website, the award winning hiking simulation “Leadership and Team Simulation: Everest V3” by Michael A. Roberto and Amy C. Edmondson uses the backdrop of Mount Everest in a simulated expedition to demonstrate and reinforce group dynamics for students and leadership. Participants of the Mt Everest expedition play in one of five roles on a team of outdoor climbers who attempt to climb the mountain, which is available in English, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, Portuguese, French, and Arabic. This HealthySimulation.com article by Erin Carn-Bennett, MSN, RN shares more about this fascinating team education exercise available instantly online!
In each of the rounds of play the players must discuss as a team whether to attempt the next camp on the way up to the summit. Teams have to climb through five of the camps in six simulated days. The total simulation time is approximately one and a half hours. Team members are tasked to analyze information on weather, health conditions, supplies, goals, and walk speed. While in the simulation team mates determine how much information to communicate to their other teammates. On the journey, team members must make decisions in response to three hidden challenges which affect their ascent, hiking speed, health, and overall success.
The Version 3 of the simulation retains the same main experience and learning objectives and features key improvements for students and faculty. The latest version includes a new design and layout, new team challenges, new team assignment options (such as the ability to work in pairs), new instructions and videos, and better usability across devices.
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A complete V3 Transition Guide, as well as educational recommendations, free trials, videos and more are available to those educators who are registered. The Everest V3 course was designed and developed to comply with WCAG 2.0 AA standards.
View the HealthySimulation.com LEARN CE/CME Platform Webinar Improving Teamwork and Event Management with Virtual and Augmented Reality to learn more!
The listed learning objectives from Leadership and Team Simulation: Everest V3 include:
- How to build, participate, and lead effective teams
- Learn how teams can improve the way in which decisions are made
- Experience how opposition of interests and asymmetric information affects a teams dynamics
- See how leaders shape team decisions and performance in competitive and time sensitive environments
- Learn how teams and leaders deal with the tradeoffs of short term task completion and long term team effectiveness
- Experience how a cognitive bias impairs the process to make decisions
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About the Simulation Experience Authors
Amy C. Edmondson is the Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management at the Harvard Business School, which is a chair that has been established to support the study of human interactions that lead to successful creation of enterprises that contribute to the improvement of society. Amy studies teams, psychological safety, and organizational education.
Amy has had numerous articles that have been published in a number of academic and management spaces. The 2019 book, The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation and Growth (Wiley), is hugely successful and has been translated into 15 languages. Edmondson’s latest book, Right Kind of Wrong (Atria), is built on her prior work on psychological safety and teams to supply a framework for thoughts about, discussion, and practice of the science of how to fail well.
Michael Roberto is the Trustee Professor of Management at Bryant University in Smithfield, RI. This follows on from a six year role in the faculty at Harvard Business School.
Professor Roberto published his newest book, Unlocking Creativity, in 2019 (John Wiley & Sons). There have also been two previous books written by Roberto: Why Great Leaders Don’t Take Yes For An Answer (2nd edition published in 2013), and Know What You Don’t Know, published in 2009.
Professor Roberto’s research and teaching have achieved several awards. The Everest Leadership and Team Simulation (from Harvard Business Publishing) won a top prize in 2011 in the eLearning category at the 16th Annual MITX Interactive Awards. Professor Roberto has taught in the leadership development programs and consulted at a number of firms such as: Mars, Deloitte, Google, Target, Apple, FedEx, Disney, Morgan Stanley, IBM, Wal-Mart, Amica, and Textron. Michael has also presented at numerous government organizations such as the FBI, NASA, Joint Special Operations Command, the Air War College, NATO, West Point, and the Secret Service.
Other Online Simulated Learning Experiences for Leadership and Teamwork
Forio is a company which creates bespoke virtual simulations for any workplace team. Forio was involved in the creation of the Everest V3 simulation and has this plus a number of other virtual simulations for team education available for purchase. Forio virtual simulation programs work on a number of devices that includes: computers, tablets and phones.
Forio is able to take a project’s pedagogy and create an analysis and visualization to a developed interactive educational tool. Despite the fact that the virtual simulations in their online store are not healthcare team based clinical simulations, there is still potential utility of healthcare teams. As the learner of today seeks fun and technology in skill acquisition, the ability to acquire skills that are relevant to medicine but not about the medicine appeals to many.
Forio virtual simulations have a number of either quantitative or qualitative finance based virtual simulations that focus on both teamwork and leadership. Forio is able to support thousands of users in both the single and multiplayer mode. The virtual simulations are translated into many languages for use across the globe.
Forio has the ability to develop custom softwares which can be designed collaboratively alongside customers. The software and services are utilized by business, universities, and government agencies on an international scale. The virtual simulations also focus on education and strategic plans for mid- and senior-level managers as well as those about to step into these roles.
Harvard Business University and Stanford Business University are examples of a few collaborations with Universities which Forio has. The extensive available catalog of ready to go corporate and executive virtual simulation training have been developed alongside the best business schools internationally. These include Harvard Business School, Wharton, Stanford, Kellogg, MIT Sloan, and others as well.
Today’s learners are virtual and technology natives who seek more immersive and engaging educational experiences outside of the healthcare realm. These virtual non medical simulations show a lot of promise to the healthcare simulation community. As non medical team based education solutions that teach soft skills become popular with modalities such as escape rooms, these educational virtual options will peak the interest of those in healthcare. With support and establishment of these programs from elite schools such as Harvard and Stanford, there is no doubt that the pedagogy of this team training is useful for those in the healthcare simulation space.
Visit the Harvard Everest Simulation Page to Learn More!
Erin Carn-Bennett is a Simulation Nurse Educator for the Douglas Starship Simulation Programme in Auckland, New Zealand. Carn-Bennett has her Masters of Nursing and has an extensive nursing career within pediatric emergency and also nursing management. She is passionate about debriefing and all things simulation. Carn-Bennett is a member of the IPSS board of directors. Carn-Bennett is the lead host of the podcast Sim Nurse NZ.
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