Playing Games for Fun and Profit. the Line Between Work and Play Is Becoming Increasingly Blurred in Companies All Across America Today

Playing games for fun and profit. The line between work and play is becoming increasingly blurred in companies all across America today. To illustrate that point, technology industry research firm Gartner estimates that by 2014 approximately 70 percent of large enterprises will use game techniques for at least one business process.

For its part, market researcher M2 Research expects that revenue from “gamification” software, consulting and marketing will explode – from about $100 million today to more than $900 million by 2014.

These bullish forecasts – and Gartner’s belief that enterprise expectations for gamification have yet to peak – reflect the fact that online gaming has become a significant pursuit for people when they’re not on the job. A research survey by GSN Games Network, for instance, indicates that 60 percent of respondents play online games daily and spend more than 11 hours a week playing. Driven in large part by the rapid emergence and expansion of social networks and smartphones, gaming is seen by legions of off-duty workers as a way to relax and stimulate the brain.

When it comes to using games in the workplace, however, it’s all about enhancing employee engagement and learning as companies strive to become knowledge organizations that can move quickly and smartly in the complex and competitive global marketplace.

2 From my perspective, there are five main • STOKING OUR Another noteworthy enterprise learning reasons why the business community has COMPETITIVE INSTINCTS game, in my opinion, is Microsoft’s Ribbon embraced gamification as a learning tool: People like to face off and test Hero 2, which teaches people about themselves against friendly rivals. Microsoft Office Suite. As one enthusiastic • NO ATTENTION DEFICIT And when learning games offer points, reviewer said Ribbon Hero 2 is like “playing Games really do up-level engagement. badges or leader boards that let players on Xbox live, minus the screaming People are interested; they focus; and view one another’s scores, performance 12-year-olds.” Featuring comic strips, they stick with the learning material. is heightened – and more knowledge is colorful graphics, surprise animations, gained and shared. multiple levels, time travel, space ships, • OFFSETTING BOREDOM Greek Gods, and bow-and-arrow battles, Business life can be exciting and • STAYING CONNECTED Ribbon Hero 2 revolves around the story enriching; but, obviously, it’s not always The virtual office means that many of Clippy, Microsoft’s infamous paperclip fun. Games that offer knowledge are employees work from home or helper. With each time period, players generally upbeat, and they add spice remote locations; they rarely meet to get to explore a new game board with and sparkle to what can sometimes be collaborate and create. Team-based challenges they must complete to get a dull day-to-day company existence. games help even the most dispersed to the next level. Each challenge takes teams bond, and this frequently boosts learners into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or • NON-TRAINING TRAINING the quality of innovation. OneNote to complete a task. The new, easy-to-use game teaches There are many new enterprise learning without telling. People interact and games that get employees’ competitive learn, but they don’t always know juices flowing in the name of acquiring they’re actually learning. This informal more knowledge and driving business approach is often preferable to formal results. But I like two in particular. classroom settings, where many people Bunchball, for example, has created feel uncomfortable and unmotivated. an app called Nitro for Salesforce that We also know that employees do not integrates directly into the leading cloud generally share what they’ve learned in CRM platform, Salesforce.com. Nitro a classroom with organizational peers offers competing players, teams and and colleagues. groups an array of incentives and rewards for performing, and its leader board scores are closely watched throughout the process. In many respects, this represents the gamification of more conventional dashboard reporting.

3 As a result, people compete against • LIMITS: Every business issue can’t About the Author colleagues, classmates and friends for be solved by turning it into a game. the highest Ribbon Hero 2 scores – as Certain information – like that in the Jason Gorfine well as the best ways to make Microsoft HR department – just needs to be Office Suite a highly productive business known, and shouldn’t be made lighter, is the User Experience tool. Some people even put their Ribbon more competitive, or turned into an Manager at Tableau Hero 2 scores on their resumes! Despite analogy. Also, developing and Software. He has been their tremendous potential for extending deploying big, large-scale games is working in both the knowledge throughout companies, usually problematic and ineffective. training and marketing next-generation enterprise learning games • PLANNING: Companies cannot move industries for over 13 years. He has led require a good deal of managerial thought, into gaming blindly. A big budget and web/mobile UX design and consulting care and consideration before they’re fully lots of corporate desire are not enough efforts for clients such as Bloomberg, implemented within an organization. to generate required results. Early State Street Global Advisors, T-Mobile, strategic thinking is a must, and one and Walmart. An award-winning Here are five key variables to help central question is whether to buy or designer, Gorfine holds an undergraduate insure success: build your game – or both. degree in Mass Communications from • FOCUS: Before gaming technology is • BACKLASH: Organizational culture can Virginia Tech. adopted, it’s important to understand be affected by gaming technology. what skill, behavior, or area you’re So companies need to watch carefully trying to improve. Games need specific that friendly competition doesn’t intent around them, and managers ever get out of hand, fostering ill-will need to make certain that they’re not among employees. being open-ended as they deploy this learning technology. In addition, it’s The future of enterprise gaming is essential that the games actually reward bright. And it will be part of a rich desired behaviors, rather than doling variety. In several years, for example, I out meaningless awards, points or envision an increasing amount of blended badges that are unrelated to business learning – including teachers, games, results. Alignment with your company’s virtual learning, and e-learning – with overarching business goals is all the tools in the mix as well, especially also essential. mobile devices. Hopefully, this will help • DESIGN: This really matters. If a game everyone in an organization gain the isn’t interesting or relevant, or if it’s necessary knowledge to advance the too easy or too hard, it won’t have business – regardless of individual or the desired impact on the top or learning styles. bottom lines.

Xerox Learning Services designs and delivers technology-enabled learning solutions and strategic learning consulting services. Xerox believes that learning can empower individuals and transform organizations. The company is committed to the idea that learning can drive business performance and growth.

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