Adding VR to the can

The 31-year-old is French but lives in Sandefjord, Norway. Before joining Jotun, Matthieu worked in a company organising outdoor sports events, such as the Tour de France.

“Earlier I used to see bikes and cycling helmets. Now it’s forklifts and safety hardhats”, Matthieu laughs.

He’s now in a completely different industry. Jotun Group is a global paints and coatings manufacturer with 40 factories and more than 10,000 employees worldwide.

“Instead, I get to take part in some really interesting digital learning projects and collaborate with colleagues from different Jotun sites throughout the world”, he continues.

As a member of the Learning & Development department in Jotun, Matthieu’s task is to make sure the employees (internally known as penguins) never stop growing.

“In Jotun, we want our employees to keep on learning new skills and develop their performance. We collaborate with all departments to build relevant courses and training modules. To succeed in this and create a better Jotun, we need to keep innovating”, Matthieu explains.

There are a lot of exciting digital learning tools available today.

“For instance, a couple of months ago we went to Oman to film 360 content for an upcoming VR training for our employees in operations. The pilot training module is now out, and feedback has been fabulous. For sure, there will be more VR projects going forward, and I can’t wait to bring this further”, he says.

While there, Matthieu packed his schedule as full as possible. Amongst other things, he secured photo and video footage of some of the smart energy saving initiatives taking place in Jotun Oman.

To take it from the top, Jotun’s main take on sustainability is to create premium paints and coatings. This way the customers’ assets – buildings, ships and infrastructure – are properly protected and live longer. In addition, you have internal initiatives such as reducing waste and running on renewable energy.

“We also came to Oman to start building content for a gamified sustainability training, and to document some of the sustainability initiatives being launched there. It was amazing to see the 5,000 m2 of solar panels on the roof of the factory”, Matthieu says.

He’s happy to learn new things himself, when visiting new places and meeting with new colleagues.

“In Oman, they even have installed solar tubes on the roof of the warehouse to provide light without using lamps. How clever is that!?”.