Virtual reality is a term that’s been thrown around a lot recently. It’s been the centre of a massive 360° hype, with countless companies rushing to incorporate VR into their strategies without taking full advantage of the opportunities that it presents. Because of that, many people reckon it’s past it’s best. You might even be yawning at the mention! Well, stick with us a for little longer, we promise you won’t be disappointed...

Here at Chatter we reckon that, with a bit of care and consideration and not just using VR for “cool’s” sake, there’s loads of potential for it to enhance the way business attract, recruit and engage their people. From immersive ‘day in the life’ videos, to live talks and 360° infographics, businesses around the world are taking VR by the horns to bring their culture to life.

We’ve pulled together a few of our favourites. So get your headsets at the ready (don’t forget to set the video to VR mode by tapping the headset button on the video) and prepare to jump into the future of your people communications…

So to kick things off, what’s your favourite chocolate? Your dream supercar? Your tipple of choice? Now, imagine if it was your job to ask those questions every day… pretty cool, huh? Well, The Telegraph recently commissioned a series of short 360° ‘Day in the life of’ videos to give an insight into weird and wonderful jobs in the UK. From stunt driving to gin distilling (though best not to put those two together…) and everything in between, the series allows us to jump right into the action of some of the quirkiest jobs in the country.

You can check out the full series here, but our favourite has got to be Kat Dixon. She’s a Senior Aquarist at the Sea Life London Aquarium, and spends her days chilling out with this dapper looking bunch…

Stopped thinking about all that chocolate and Gin? Well I hope so, because you’ll need a stomach of steel for this next one… Last year, the US Air Force special ops launched a 360° campaign that puts candidates right at the heart of the action. With the strapline ‘We need people who can do this’, the series is the antithesis of a sugar coated attraction campaign. The footage is raw and authentic, featuring the kind of heart stopping, nerve tingling and hair raising situations that special ops recruits experience day in day out. You can rescue a fallen colleague, have a seat in the cockpit and even jump out of a plane whilst in a boat (it’s called a zodiac drop, and it gives Bond a run for his money!)

You can find them all here, but the one that’s had us all swaying around the Roost is this HALO jump, a tactic used by US Air Force special ops to enter hostile territory undetected when threats are expected. Sounds intense!

When they’re not jumping out of planes, open, honest and frank discussion is one of the best ways to keep your employees engaged. Whether it’s a tech talk from the hottest new start up, a panel of industry experts chatting about latest trends, or just an internal get together over a couple of beers and a pizza… Businesses around the world are embracing the power of discussion to keep their people intrigued, educated, and most importantly, engaged.

For Amazon’s up and coming rival, Jet.com, tech talks and other continued learning events have become the lifeblood of their company. With one of their values being ‘Transparency’, they think that openly sharing information and ideas empowers people to do amazing things. Putting this into action, they opened their doors to the public and invited them to view one of the tech talks in 360°...

A company's brand is one of its most valuable assets, and a huge element of that is culture. From behaviours to values, a company should aspire to employ people who embody their culture. In doing so, they become brand advocates; a group of proud, passionate and engaged people who live, eat and breathe their brand.

At CollegeHumor, a leading online entertainment company founded by two high school best friends, their culture is everything. Afterall, if your job description includes spending your days finding the funniest and most off beat content on the web, you’d expect to find yourself in an equally wild and wonderful working environment. Well, not ones to disappoint, the guys at CollegeHumor opened their doors for a 360° tour of their regular, boring, ‘nothing weird here’ office...

Culture is established from a company's story. It’s the humble beginnings, key milestones, and vision of the future that bring their culture to life for a candidate, so communicating the story in a clear, concise and authentic way is a big challenge for lots of businesses. Infographics have become a bit of a celebrity for taking complex content and translating it into a simple and digestible message, because of this, lots of businesses are using them to explore their heritage and tell their stories.

A story we didn’t see coming was Michelle Obama’s recent rise to queen, or first lady of social media (all thanks to that Turnip video), and neither did the guys at The Verge. They brought the story to life in a whole new dimension, using a mixture of 360° footage and animated infographics to let us walk through the story, literally...

So, still yawning? I didn’t think so. If you fancy having a chat about how VR could bring your people strategy to life, you know where we are…