Is gamification the answer to sustainable innovation? As you'll see, the answer is most likely a resounding 'yes'.
Gamification can fairly be assessed as a disruptive innovation. This technique has revolutionized the educational and corporate training industries, and is expected to soon reach a global market worth of 5.5 billion, an impressive growth of 67% within just five years. It has become commonplace within the business world, as nearly 80% of organizations are using some type of gamification in the workplace. While training is one of the primary uses for gamification, another obvious choice is gamification for managing the corporate innovation strategy. Is gamification the answer to sustainable innovation? As you'll see, the answer is most likely a resounding 'yes'.
Gamification Engages and Stimulates Right-Brain Creativity
Gamification is strong in the arena of education and employee
training, but it also has a lot to offer the realm of innovation.
Innovation is primarily a creative process, and gamification is an excellent way to stimulate the right side of the brain, which is responsible for creative thought and problem solving. Right brain stimulation is also linked to the production of hormones associated with happiness. So, not only does gamification help your innovation team become more creative, it also helps them enjoy the process more.
Gamification Improves Engagement and Interest
Wouldn't you like for your innovators to be as enthralled with producing and developing new ideas as they are with the latest smartphone app or TV show? Gamification is an excellent way to boost interest levels and improve engagement in the innovation process. Ideally, you will build a culture that uses innovation gaming in lieu of games with no productive aspects, like Farmville or Candy Crush. Instead of taking breaks to send friends irritating notifications about what seed packs they need, workers will begin using those moments of free time to brainstorm and fine-tune great ideas. As we will discuss in a few moments, there are several ways to create a gamification application that will help your employees view innovation as a welcome break from their workday, encouraging them to participate in that instead of wasting time with purposeless games.
Gamification Encourages Performance Improvement Through Natural Competitiveness
People have a natural tendency to compete with each other. Gamification
takes this inclination and channels it into a way to spark people
to innovate better and do it more frequently.
People are naturally competitive, and gamification channels this competitiveness into productivity with innovation. It is natural for workers to want to outdo each other with ideas, or to improve someone else's ideas with their own twists and flourishes. This means that gamification is not only wonderful for encouraging innovators to produce new ideas, it is also excellent for helping them hone the ideas of others. In the end, everyone is a winner, because they are all a part of producing and developing excellent and highly refined innovations that go on to be tremendous success stories.
Gamification Helps Promote Collaboration Among Workers
Have you noticed the tendency for game and gaming app developers to include social sharing features in their games? For instance, if you're playing Guess the Emoji and come across one that utterly stumps you, you can reach out to friends on Facebook for help. Gamification encourages this collaboration in the innovation process. Since two (or three or a dozen) heads are better than one, the result is always a better and more fully-developed idea.
Gamification Gives Participants the Incentive of Being a Part of Something Important Outside Themselves
Wouldn't you like to be able to say that you had a part in developing Google's search algorithms, or perhaps helping Coca-Cola decide on a recipe, or maybe deciding that Twitter should be a 140-character platform? All of these genius ideas are successful, and anyone would be ecstatic to say they had a hand in making them happen. Games have a way of making people feel like they are a part of something larger and more important than themselves, and this is the hallmark of great innovation. Use games to help your teams develop innovations they can all be a proud part of, just like gamers flock to participate in things like the world's largest World of Warcraft guild or rush to become beta testers for the new Star Wars game.
Gamification is a Great Way to Break Down Social Biases in the Organization
Games have a way of leveling the playing field and putting
the top executives on the same plain as other workers. This
breaks the barriers that often inhibit innovation.
Is your organization conditioned to think of innovation as something that only comes from the top? If so, gamification is a smart way to break down the barriers and bring innovation to the rank and file workers, too. Gaming has a way of breaking down barriers and social biases and bringing everyone together. Have you noticed how a game of Pictionary or charades helps break the ice and remove social barriers at the office Christmas party? For a couple of hours, the mail room folks are on a level field with the CEO and president of the company. Games have a way of doing that, which means that gamification can help encourage innovation across the organization and up and down the ranks.
How to Assure That Gamification is Working Right for Your Innovation Team
In order for gamification to work for your innovation team, it's important to incorporate some of the features of a great game. It pays to spend some time playing other popular games like Angry Birds or Fallout to identify what makes those games so addictive. Every great gamification platform needs a system of rewards. 'Players' need to feel like they're making progress and accomplishing something. This can be done in a number of ways, including:
- Awarding achievement badges when a task is done.
- Providing levels for players to work through.
- Enabling leader boards so that players can see how they are measuring up to the competition (other innovators.)
- Virtual currency that can be redeemed for valuable items, either in the game or in real life (for example, you can reward them within the game by letting them use their virtual currency to buy tools, or you can reward them in real life by allowing them to redeem the virtual currency from their innovation game for things like getting off early one day or freebies in the break room.
- A progress bar that allows participants to see their progress so that they know how far they've come and how far they need to get within a certain time (such as a single session or a week of innovation work.)
Are you ready to get started with better innovation management? HYPE Innovation can help. Click to schedule a demo and up the ante on your innovation strategy today.
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