The Story of the Dream of the Audi Learning Valley to the Reality of Audi Virtual Trainings (AVT)

by Heiko Schmidt (Head of Dealer Development/Training Sales) and Christiane Nicolai (Qualification Specialist for Specialists and
Executives of the Sales Organization in the area of Service, Digital Learning Designs and Gamification, both: AUDI AG)
from the handbook Digital Competence and Future Skills
Will learning take place primarily digitally, and if so, what will it look like? Inspired by the idea of raising learning to a digital, different level, the idea came to Audi to build a kind of 'learning homeland'. A 'homeland' where learners simply feel at home. Everything would have to be possible there, always and everywhere: Learning as a digital multimodal approach. Learners should be able to learn in a fun, playful, location-independent and, above all, contextual way.
After many thought loops and mental ramblings, the idea of Audi Learning Valley popped up. A major digital learning hub for the Audi partner organization. Learning should take place there in a completely different, exciting and playful way. We set out on an unknown and challenging journey.
This chapter describes the exacting journey of Audi to develop a completely new training approach for its dealer organization in Germany. Learning and the constant thirst for knowledge is becoming omnipresent. Learning as a digital and multimodal construct is becoming a constant companion of a modern and urban society, taking place at work, on the way to work, in the car, on the train, on the plane, in leisure time, simply everywhere and constantly. Based on these considerations, the chapter gives deep insights into the development of one of the leading 3D learning projects in Germany.
The handbook Digital Competence and Future Skills provides comprehensive insight into the future of competencies and learning and the transformation of business. For the first time, leading companies from a wide range of industries around the world provide concrete insights into their comprehensive approaches to transformation, competence management, culture change, and learning and development. In addition, leading scientists and institutions use the latest research findings to assess where we are today and what is to come in the future.
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Heiko Schmidt
is a creative designer, a thinker and also a chaotic person with a desire to think the present in a new and different way. He dreams of a networked world in which people take care of each other. In which versatility and appreciation are lived. In which the 'we' counts more than the 'I' and in which people experiment so that even small changes can have a big impact. He studied business administration with a focus on organizational development and sociology at the University of Siegen, Germany.
After his traineeship at Jaguar Deutschland GmbH with a focus on marketing and sales, he began his further career at AUDI AG in Ingolstadt in 1999. Here he worked in a wide variety of business areas and functions with a focus on strategy development, organizational/personnel development, change/transformation management, as well as in Beijing, to set up a sales academy.
Since 2013, he has been Head of Dealer Development/Training Sales and is responsible for the selection, training and development of the various target groups of the Audi partner organization in Germany. In addition to these topics, he focuses on topics such as: Transformation/Cultural Management, Educational Research, as well as broader socially relevant future topics.
Christiane Nicolai
is a Training Manager at AUDI AG for specialized After Sales Executives and Managers in the non-technical part of the Audi Partner Organization. Since decades, her research has been focused on finding optimal opportunities and conditions for individual learning, the design of self organized learning processes and learning arrangements. Due to her fascination and relevance of those concepts in times of digital change and transformation, a main emphasis of her work has been to implement her findings in digital and hybrid learning formats through digital learning design and gamification.
She studied pedagogy with a focus on adult education at the Justus-Liebig-University in Gießen, Germany and was involved in several scientific research projects of the Bund-Länder-Kommission on the topic of medial learning processes and professional competence development. In 1998, she took these topics to AUDI AG. Here she worked in internal education and training for the group's employees and took over the development of an in-house e-learning team. Since 2009, she has been developing digital learning designs and innovative learning media for self-organized learning processes, among other things, as one of her core areas in the Sales division.
Publishing Editor: Dr. Philipp Ramin
Dr. Philipp Ramin is a leading expert on digital transformation and future skills. With his company the Innovation Center for Industry 4.0 in Regensburg, Germany, which he founded whilst completing his Ph.D. on the topic of discontinuous innovation and digital business models, he trains more than 200,000 employees in 9 languages for leading companies from a wide range of industrial, business and financial sectors in more than 14 countries worldwide and has prepared a number of internationally recognized studies, for example on digitalization, artificial intelligence, digital competence. The Innovation Center for Industry 4.0 team, which was also instrumental in realizing this book, develops individual qualification solutions in the area of digitalization and Industry 4.0 for leading companies worldwide, including complete continuing education curricula and learning strategies as well as AR/VR solutions or complete digital online learning systems and competence management programs.
In 2022, together with one of his clients in the automotive sector, Philipp Ramin's company was awarded the recognized 'Project of the Year' eLearning Award for Instructional Design by Germany's leading publisher in this field, elearning Journal for a state-of-the art digital competence upskilling program with high acceptance, artificial intelligence supported gamification elements and proven and measured acceleration of the transformation process.