An avatar is an animated figure that represents a person in a
virtual world. They can be personalised to a highly detailed degree
with the user's choice of hair and skin colour, hairstyle, clothes
and accessories.
Gartner has said that companies must gain control over these
elements when an employee is representing their company or risk
digital embarrassment.
"We advise establishing codes of behavior that apply in any
circumstance when an employee is acting as a company
representative, whether in a real or virtual environment," said
James Lundy, managing vice president at Gartner. "Addendums
specific to virtual environments can be added as required.”
Most companies have policies outlining how staff should behave
online when representing their company and how they should use the
company's web and email facilities. Gartner said that within four
years, 70% of companies will have policies governing their
behaviour in virtual environments and the look of their
avatars.
"By year-end 2013, 70% of enterprises will have behaviour
guidelines and dress codes established for all employees who have
avatars associated with the enterprise inside a virtual
environment," said Gartner.
“As the use of virtual environments for business purposes grows,
enterprises need to understand how employees are using avatars in
ways that might affect the enterprise or the enterprise’s
reputation,” said Lundy.
Gartner also outlined six steps companies should take to control
employees' appearance and behaviour in virtual environments when
they are on company business.
It said that a company's code of conduct for employees' use of
the internet should be extended to cover virtual environments and
avatar appearance. "Companies with codes of conduct for other web
activities, such as blogging, should be able to extend those
policies into virtual environments. However, because 3-D
environments add the visual dimension, they will need to make sure
that their policies also cover dress codes," it said.
Gartner also advised that companies tell employees to create an
entirely new persona for work activities that is separate to their
personal one. "Organizations can avoid problems with employees
mixing their personal and professional avatar interaction and
activities by suggesting that employees use one avatar for their
work interactions and another avatar for personal activities," it
said.
The company also says, though, that firms should be sensitive to
the fact that people take pride in their avatars and have a
personal affinity with them.
Gartner said that control of users' avatars should be tested in
a pilot environment where they can learn what issues and problems
arise. It said that avatar use is likely to increase as firms seek
to cut travel costs and host virtual meetings.
"One of the biggest uses of avatars appears to be for online
meetings," it said. "Web meetings are emerging as an important new
use case for virtual environments, and this may be a good point at
which to start learning about the issues and opportunities
surrounding users and avatars."
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