Why 2019 will be the Year of Gamification in Corporate Learning
What do employees want from corporate learning programs and how can organizations respond? We explore how multiple factors contribute to 2019 being the year of gamification in corporate learning.
Corporate learning is under the spotlight as success factors for organizations are rapidly evolving. Digital transformation, adoption of AI in the workplace, and changing workforce demographics are just a few factors that have influenced a marked shift in skills requirements for organizations. Given this reality, learning and development (L&D) leaders and HR leaders must respond to these changes by developing skills internally through upskilling and reskilling initiatives.
Unfortunately, regardless of how informative or beneficial corporate learning is, it simply isn’t the first thing employees think of doing when they have some free time. While offering financial incentives and compulsory training programs can help you fill classroom seats, it is useless if the learners aren’t engaged. This is where gamification can help.
Also Read: Gamification and Learning: What You Must Know
Why Gamification? Why Now?
According to a recent PwC survey, most organizations lack skills that will help them thrive in a digital world. With technologies like AI, machine learning, and data analytics becoming increasingly valuable across all industries, HR leaders are hard-pressed to fill open positions with these capabilities. Developing skills internally is an option, however, a lack of engagement with learning programs among employees is a challenge that many L&D leaders are yet to surmount.
By integrating the principles of gamification, organizations can boost engagement with their learning and development programs. Game attributes like goals, challenges, instant feedback, affirmation of performance, safety from failure, and curiosity, when applied to corporate learning programs, can help stimulate enjoyment and engagement transforming tedious, boring learning experiences into a fun and rewarding experience. Gamification addresses and applies theories of repeated retrieval and spaced repetition to drive noticeable behavioral change in learners.
Also Read: Gamification and HR – Not Just Fun and Games
With Gen Z expected to join the workforce in large numbers in 2019, organizations will need to meet the unique learning needs of a multigenerational workforce spanning five decades. Diane Belcher, Senior Director of Product Management at Harvard Business Publishing Corporate Learning, believes personalization will be critical to engaging different generations with L&D programs. She says, “To accommodate the unique learning needs of a multigenerational workforce, it comes down to personalization. In our extensive research into learner preferences, we uncovered that no matter what the generation, two key components are must-haves for today’s learner: personalization and relevance. Any learning opportunity needs to be personalized to the individual learner as they need to be in control of what they learn when they learn, and the format of their learning. When learning experiences have relevancy, they directly apply to a goal that learners want to achieve. Our research suggests that people will carve out time for building skills if they think that doing so will help enhance their job performance. To improve relevancy, L&D can take steps to provide content sources with excellent search capabilities and ways to scan content to determine relevance, and recommendations based on employees’ current learning behavior and habits. In this way, L&D teams can better engage learners, meet their varied needs, and generate better outcomes for programs overall.”
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Younger generations today are intimately familiar with the concept of gamification. Most of them grew up with video games and smartphones, so gamifying corporate learning can become a natural extension of learning. Additionally, as organizations look to encourage cross-generational collaboration, gamifying learning can encourage positive workplace interactions, boosting workplace morale and engagement.
In 2019, gamification will not be limited to the realm of L&D, gamification will become an essential business improvement strategy. By its virtue of being a digital learning medium, gamification makes corporate learning programs measurable, helping you better optimize your programs to meet future learning/skills requirements of the organization.
Have you implemented gamified learning programs in your organization? We’d love to hear more about your experiences in the comments section below.