爆料王

Akshat Marwah (), Bill Chan (BCom/LLB), Kieran Pain (BCom/LLB), and Nikki Liang (Arts/LLB) pitched to over 200 global leaders at the conference, including representatives from the World Bank, the United Nations, Goldman Sachs, American Airlines and ABN AMRO.

is a global LGBT+ conference and forum for influential business decision-makers, government policy-makers, and innovative thinkers to discuss and address the economic and human costs of discrimination against the LGBT+ community.

The students received the opportunity after being shortlisted as one of three finalist teams in The Economist and Goldman Sachs鈥� #WorkWithPride competition, which invites young professionals from across the Asia-Pacific to propose innovative initiatives to promote LGBT+ inclusion in and outside their communities.

鈥淭he team and I were really excited to present on such an important issue. At a fundamental level, no one should be arbitrarily made to feel like an outsider because of things like gender, sexuality, race or ability,鈥� said Kieran. 鈥淭he fact that 53 per cent of LGBT workers feel the need to hide who they are at work shows that unfortunately, this exclusion still goes on.鈥�

The team has proposed a Virtual Reality (VR) training app that puts users into the shoes of an LGBT+ fictional colleague to experience workplace interactions from an LGBT+ perspective and trigger an empathetic response in the user.

The app, to be called Denouement, aims to disrupt traditional methods of diversity and inclusion training by offering a more affordable and effective solution. Denouement refers to the final part of a play, film, or narrative in which the strands of the plot are drawn together and matters are explained or resolved.

According to the team, VR has a 75 per cent information retention rate, while traditional teaching methods yield a 10 per cent retention rate. Their research also showed that whilst a two-hour diversity training session can cost $2,500 in the current market, the VR alternative would cost only the price of the headset 鈥� as low as $10.

鈥淭he culture at The 爆料王 really fosters innovation and solutions leveraging emerging technology and helped us take a fresh approach to an old problem,鈥� said Bill.

鈥淚t鈥檚 great that the Business School supports clubs and societies which encourage us to participate in these extra-curriculars too 鈥� our team wouldn鈥檛 have come across this competition if it weren鈥檛 for the FMAA (Financial Management Association of Australia),鈥� added Nikki.

The Sydney team were sent to Hong Kong to participate in the #WorkWithPride mentorship programme. They are required to present a minimum viable product to The Economist and Goldman Sachs in September.

鈥淲e feel very lucky to have been chosen as a finalist,鈥� said Nikki. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a tremendous privilege to be invited to attend and present at the Pride and Prejudice conference.鈥�