Gamification and Incentivization for Driving Business Processes

NYBPP Meetup (2/16/2017)

Highlights and Q&A

Agenda

I. Gamification and Incentivization for Driving Business Processes – Gamification for Business Operations– Associating Game Mechanics with Process and Value Drivers– Mix Drivers to Promote Value Optimization– Playing Games: Using Time as Another Incentive Layer – Dashboard Visualization and Process Transparency – Summary

II. Q&A– Who decides what is value adding in a process in order to gamify it?– Does gamification apply to software development, or IT in general?– How can you gamify boring tasks or elements of compliance?– How will gamification differ between generations in terms of effectiveness and

sustainability?

Gamification and Incentivization for Driving Business Processes

Discussing the foundation of gamifying complex business processes

Gamification for Business Operations

● Gamification is the application of game-design elements and game principles in non-game contexts.

Gamification is based off an idea called flow: the mental state of operation in which the person in the process of performing the activity is completely immersed in a feeling of energized focus and enjoyment.

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Associating Game Mechanics with Process and Value Drivers

How do we know what to gamify?

● Value drivers have to be derived from your value chain.

○ Without knowing the value chain, you risk creating a game that disrupts, instead of enhances the process.

● Once the value chain is identified, it should be clear what the customer is paying for within the operation.

○ It is these elements (typically speed, cost, expertise, etc.) which must be tied to game elements.

● The game should clearly promote play that directly enhances a process’ value proposition.

Mix Drivers to Promote Value Optimization

You need to properly balance a mixture or combination of gamified drivers, which adds a more complicated layer to the equation!

Once you understand how to connect to value drivers, care must be applied to mix incentives in order to optimize the entire value chain, not just parts of it.

You have to understand the relation of all the variables in the value chain and how you can optimize all areas instead of sacrificing in one area to gain in another (e.g. speed over quality, or cost over speed). Poorly balanced drivers can compromise value creation.

Playing Games: Using Time as Another Incentive Layer

What is the biggest element we add to operating processes by introducing gaming?

Time!

● You can change the dynamic of repetitive work by adding visualized tracking and scoring over time

• This makes continued performance incentivized on a different dimension • The same task can actually build a different goal when repeated over and over

Dashboard Visualization and Process Transparency

What makes gamification so powerful? Making a complete process and value chain transparent, which otherwise wouldn’t be easily visualized or understood by staff doing small parts of it.

● Employees can see what they're doing and what their peers are doing, which promotes information transparency between parties, flow, and collaborative optimization.

● Competition is really just the incentivization to draw on best practice from the bright spots in the operation (which can be visualized for everyone to see through gaming).

● Also, staff can selectively see key value drivers of upstream or downstream processes.

Summary

• Dynamics can be added on top of “work” to make it more enjoyable, achieving productivity increases in operations. This approach is called gamification.

• Good game design is difficult because it relies on a clear and accurate understanding of a process’ value chain and individual drivers.

• Mixing and understanding different game drivers and how they could impact process optimization is complicated, but essential to making a game sustainable in the long term.

•Visualizing the game as much as possible is what will drive participation, knowledge, collaboration, and results.

Q&A

Answering questions from the Meetup

Who decides what is value adding in a process in order to gamify it?

You don’t!

● The customer always defines value and a process’ value chain is defined by the market spending money on your process (or not).

● It is the job of a process professional to simply identify (not define) what parts of a process are value adding and non-value adding, which should serve as the foundation for gamification.

Does gamification apply to software development, or IT in general?

Yes.

● Gamification can be done to any process, and software development, or IT more broadly, has as much process as any other corporate department.

● This doesn’t mean we should gamify every aspect of the SDLC or IT, as many of these processes are project processes, which are less likely to provide additional value from gamification (when compared to operations).

How can you gamify boring tasks or elements of compliance?

Incentivization.

● “Boring” is subjective, but if we think about “boring” as highly tedious, repetitive, low-complexity tasks, gamification can add incentives to perform the task in a certain way over a time period, increasing complexity and therefore making the task more engaging.

● Compliance is usually considered business non-value add from a process perspective and should not be considered as a value driver eligible for gamification.

How will gamification differ between generations in terms of effectiveness and sustainability?

It won’t!

● While these two demographics are very different in their perceptions, motivations, and subjective views, the principles of gamifying based on the value chain will remain the same, and add maximum value to gamification efforts when carried out in a consistent and disciplined way.

THANK YOU FOR COMING!

•Thank you so much for coming to our meetup – we hope to see you again in future sessions and please don’t hesitate to post additional questions on the group discussion board.

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