Gamification: An Essential Ingredient for Success in Numerous Life Facets
Unveil the underlying principles of Gamification and its profound effects on diverse life segments, including IT, academics, and the scrum methodology deployed by developers and testers in their routine tasks.
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What exactly is gamification? Let’s plunge into its definition:
Gamification seeks to blend work with enjoyment. When gamification is applied to a non-gaming situation, it can transform it into a more attractive one. To put it simply, gamification involves the incorporation of game mechanics into an already established setting.
At its core, gamification means embracing fundamental aspects of games such as design, action or engagement, amusement, and competition, and putting them into action via game mechanics such as points, badges, and leaderboards.
What This Article Will Teach You:
Origin and Evolution of Gamification
The snippet below is derived from Dan’s whitepaper: Gamification in e-learning
The age of Gamification is believed to have originated in 1912.
The snack brand American Cracker Jack brought the notion of Gamification into the marketplace by including complimentary rewards in each pack. Although this might not conform to the formal notion of ‘Gamification,’ it is acknowledged as the inception point.
1980s: Books correlating with Gamification were published, encompassing:
- What Makes Things Fun to Learn by Thomas W. Malone
- Heuristics for designing pleasurable user interfaces: Lessons from computer games
1990 to 2002:
Innovative gamification strategies were introduced to students via computers in classroom settings. Games like ‘Math Blaster’ and ‘The Incredible Machine’ captured students’ interest. However, these games faced backlash due to the focus on repetitive practice skills for addition and subtraction rather than the curriculum.
The Serious Games Initiative (SGI) was a step taken by the US Military to develop educational games.
SGI was tasked with exploiting state-of-the-art game designs, technologies, and development capabilities to aid policy education, examination, and administration.
2003 to 2004:
Conundra emerged as the first gamification company to gamify consumer products and offer incorporated gamified enterprise. However, the company did not survive long.
Games for Change (G4C), a company aimed at making a social difference through games, came into existence. One of G4C’s most renowned games, ‘Peacemaker,’ illustrated the challenges confronted by both Israel and Palestine, thereby promoting awareness about social issues.
2007 to 2010
The popular gamification tool ‘Bunchball’ was unveiled, presenting organizations with a gamified platform. It offered elements like points, leaderboards, and badges.
The explosion of the internet sparked interest in gamification. DICE (Design Innovate Communicate Entertain) conferences posted viral videos about gamification, escalating its popularity.
In 2011
Major strides in gamification occurred in 2011:
- The inaugural Gamification Summit took place in San Francisco, attracting over 400 participants.
- Gamification’s name was listed in the Oxford dictionary’s ‘word of the year shortlist’.
- Corporate gamification started gaining traction.
- The global revenue from marketing, software, and consulting linked to gamification crossed $100 million.
Post-2011, Gamification has observed rapid advancement. Yearly conferences dedicated to Gamification are organized, books are published, and studies are performed. Companies persist in trying out varied gamification strategies, however, views on its effectiveness continue to differ.
Note: The link to the whitepaper is no longer accessible.
Why Gamification?
Gamification centers around adding puzzles, engrossing games, and quizzes to applications, thereby amplifying user experiences.
This can assist in:
- Greater user engagement
- Goal creation
- Boosting skills
- Creating a challenging atmosphere
- Realizing target accomplishments
- Offering incentives and recognition
- Boosting organizational efficiency
#1) Enhanced User Engagement:
When implementing gamification, it’s crucial to tackle two challenges:
- Delivering something valuable to the users to keep them engrossed
- Making the engagement sufficiently fascinating to stimulate sustained usage and interaction
#2)
Goal Creation:
Gamifying goal creation can significantly influence the accomplishment of those goals. Gamification designers must acquaint themselves with the S.M.A.R.T concept for effective goal creation.
The S.M.A.R.T abbreviation stands for:
Specific: Clearly articulate the goal, answering the questions “Who, What, Why, Where”.
Illustration:
Goal for an employee helping customers in hotel booking:
Specific Goal: Be capable of convincing potential customers to book rooms.
Measurable: The goal has to be quantifiable. Measure the result of the goal to determine success.
Attainable: The goal needs to be practical and achievable within the given context.
Relevant: The goal must be significant and pertinent to the individual pursuing it.
Time-Bound: Specify a deadline or timeline for accomplishing the goal.
Gamification can aid in integrating these S.M.A.R.T concepts for goal creation in a delightful and pleasurable style.
#3) Boosting Skills:
Ongoing skill enhancement is vital at the organizational level. Gamification can motivate employees to develop new skills.
Illustration: In a high-performance organization, coaching employees in self-presentation, behavioral skills, and non-work related situation management is crucial besides job-related skills.
Interactive videos can be created to guide employees on enhancing their presentation skills, phone etiquette, table manners, etc.
Situational videos can help train employees on managing unpredictable situations or dealing with demanding customers.
#4) Forming a Challenging Atmosphere:
Daily life presents diverse challenges such as rising early, exercising on a regular basis, controlling work-life balance, and dealing with difficult team members. These routine challenges can be gamified.
- Rising early can be rewarded with points or badges.
- Accomplishing daily exercise goals can unlock new stages or rewards.
- Controlling the work-life balance can be converted into a competition, with incentives for fruitful balancing.
Examples of Gamification
Let’s delve into a few illustrations of gamification:
#5) Fulfilling target accomplishments:
In a graphic design scenario, the objective could be to finalize a certain magazine layout within a defined time frame. This can be gamified by dividing the task into smaller parts, setting time restrictions, and offering badges or rewards for meeting goals.
#6) Incentives and Acknowledgement:
Rewarding and acknowledging employees is a potent incentive. Gamification can be used to invent fun methods to appreciate employees’ efforts and accomplishments.
Examples:
- Incentivizing employees who perform exceptionally well to reach their goals
- Creating a leaderboard to display high performers
#7) Realizing Organizational Efficiency:
Gamification not only inspires employees but also escalates organizational productivity. By gamifying tasks and setting targets, employees are more engaged and work towards achieving targets with more enthusiasm.
Incorporating Gamification to Various Life Elements
#1) Gamification in Health Care:
Pedometer Apps: Track weight reduction and fitness goals. The app establishes targets based on the user’s information and traces their development through steps, kilometers covered, and calories burned.
#2) Gamification in Real Estate:
Realtor Apps: Provide gamified experiences for realtors and clients. Realtors can earn badges and incentives for inviting clients, selling properties, and achieving targets. Clients can browse verified listings, virtual tours, and receive special privileges for purchasing properties.
#3) Gamification in Academics:
Socrative: A gamified app for students. It provides interactive games like Space Race, where students compete by answering syllabus-based questions. Leaderboards and levels encourage healthy rivalry and motivate students to enhance their knowledge.
Case Study
Case Study 1: Gamification in the Agile Methodology
Industry: Information Technology
Aim: Gamify the Agile Methodology
- Extract data from the project management system and display it on dashboards for improved visibility of project evolution.
- Enable workers to benefit from data and insights.
- Add gamification components to everyday activities to make them more thrilling and stimulate healthy competition.
Summary:
An app named ‘AgileFocus’ can be devised for this purpose.
- Individuals receive points and badges based on the user stories delivered within sprints, code and test case review feedback, and assistance provided to colleagues.
- Exclusive rewards are offered for concluding user stories and testing before estimations.
- A leaderboard showcases the highest performers in descending sequence.
Implementation:
- An ‘AgileFocus’ plugin can be added to project management tools like JIRA.
- The plugin uses project data and predefined rules to calculate points, referred to as ‘AgilePoints’.
- Employees can redeem these points for perks/gifts.
- Employers can use points as a performance evaluation measure if needed.
Assumptions:
- The project uses a project management tool like JIRA.
- Employees have a thorough understanding of the agile processes in the project.
- Employees are familiar with the project management tools.
Restrictions:
- Integrating with other project management tools may require time or encounter configuration issues.
Prospects:
- The app can retain historical project data and use it to analyze project efficiency across sprints.
- Development of new plugins for inter-project evaluation.
- Expansion of AgileFocus as a worldwide product for employee performance management.
- Introduction of avatars with evolving abilities based on points earned.
- Integration with social media platforms like LinkedIn.
- Implementation of a ‘Generic Challenges’ framework, allowing employees to register for challenges and complete tasks like automation, certifications, documentation, and blog writing.
Conclusion
Gamifying routine tasks in the Agile methodology can notably improve worker engagement and project deliverables. AgileFocus bestows individuals with insights into their tasks while incorporating a fun component and healthy competition. Workers can track their growth and thrive in their day-to-day activities.
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