How does Gamification Affect Motivation?

People of all ages, from children to adults love video games and adding in-game mechanics across different tasks. Educational games offer instant gratification, a dopamine release, rewards, and badges.

Gamification has now gone outside of just pure entertainment and has been used inside of learning and in the modern workplace. There are many different statistics that positively show the benefits of risen engagement and teamwork that come into place once it is implemented.

Gamification increases employee productivity.  Gamifying the workplace, from sales to operation is not a new trend and is growing by the year, and it’s pretty safe to say that it’s not going anywhere.

There are a few ways to implement gamification, from leaderboard, rewards, points, levels, and badges to even actually branded mini-games, gamification and game-based learning are increasing job engagement and motivation, satisfaction, and motivating millions of employees worldwide.

Let’s go over this in a bit more depth, and answer some widely asked questions.

How does Gamification affect employee motivation?

Human beings are known to be social animals. We need community, and we perform better while socializing as well as being validated. Isolation leads to many mental health issues. In the last decade, we’ve entered a digital age, where that need for validation has noticeably heightened by the rise of social media, and this now has transferred over into the office space. 

Employees need to feel as their efforts are being recognized.

In the past, promotions were the top way to reward and recognize high-performing employees. However, promotions become stale after a while, and they can simply not be sustainable in the long term.

Gamification is a great solution to this. Gamifying the workplace creates in-house competitions that help keep learners' motivations high throughout the week. Here are a few ways it helps achieve this: 

• Self Pride and control: Productivity and self-control go hand in hand. When employees see visual showings of their progress, they feel a sense of pride because of the productivity, and they are motivated to continue. 

• Leaderboards: Gamification boosts motivation with leaderboards. They provide intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation as well as recognition when they are winning, and if they are a few notches below someone, it creates fun competition to see who can secure the top spot. Giving an employee a birds-eye view of their current progress in comparison to others allows them to have an understanding of where they sit in terms of their current progress, and how much more they need to accomplish to beat the scores of their peers. 

• Daily to-do lists: Daily to-do lists with points and progress bars allow for employees to know and understand how they are progressing and how much further there is to go.

• Real-Time Feedback: The team that is involved will all have the transparency of knowing where the rest of the team is at in terms of results.

How does Gamification make Employees Happier?

Gamification breaks up the monotony of day-to-day tasks and creates a fun environment. Studies have shown that the effects of gamification not only increase productivity but also increases engagement and help decrease employee turnover. Your employees get more fulfillment and enjoyment out of their job, and in return, their loyalty rises.                

Here are some more specific statistics:

• 48% of employees have stated that gamification works, and increases engagement

• 72% have agreed that gamification actually inspires them to work harder.

In summary, gamification creates happier employees, which increases student motivation and engagement, productivity, and the company bottom line.

How can your company implement gamification successfully?

After reading through this blog, and deciding that gamification is right for you, the next step is implementation. This is important, as implementing gamification isn’t just a one size fits all solution. There are, however, the same few steps that every company must take and evaluate before moving forward:

1) Identify your gamification goals
2) Consider your employees
3) Pick the right Gamification software

1) Identify Your Gamification Goals

As always, begin with your gamification goal in mind. What is the purpose of this strategy? It could be more sales, or more training processes complete, or daily tasks that need to be done by teams. Gamifying these can help your employee’s tasks get done quicker and in a more fun way. 

Once your goals are established, reverse engineer them to find the best processes and implementation methods.

2) Consider Your Employees

Keep your employees in mind while you identify your gamification goals. They will be, after all, using the gamification software in their day-to-day. While management monitors the results, your employees are the ones accomplishing the taste. 

Make sure to ask for feedback, and track their engagement levels in the process.

3) Pick the Right Gamification Software

There are many different gamification software to choose from, and the reality is that choosing the right one for your business is critical in terms of your gamification project being a success. Make sure to do lots of market research, look at case studies of companies like yours who have used gamification, and don’t be afraid to ask questions! Your provider should be able to answer all of them, as well as offer recommendations on what game elements to use that will work best for your teams.

Summary

Gamification can affect your employee’s motivation in an incredibly positive way. Using gamified elements such as leaderboards, points, badges, and quests, can help keep your employees focused and task/achievement-oriented. Gamification in the workplace has statistically shown to increase engagement by up to 48%, and in return, the companies bottom line. Interested in learning more? Contact the Gamify team today.