Gamification is an innovative and engaging approach for encouraging employee learning by improving the learning experience. Not only does it offer a new approach to providing employees with new information, it is also proven to enhance knowledge retention and is remarkably effective in driving motivation.
Well designed gamification based training provides value to both organisations and employees. In this latest blog, we summarise the 5 key ways in which gamification can improve employee learning in your organisation:
- Learning is made interactive and engaging
Adding gaming elements to employee’s learning can create an interactive and “fun” solution to improving workplace learning. Bite-sized content consisting of interactive videos, customer scenarios, and follow-up assessments help to capture and retain employee’s attention as well as engage them.
Because they are more engaged, completion rates are more likely to be higher. In fact, during a 2018 survey, gamification increased employee engagement by 84%, leading to an 87% increase in productivity.
This can be further improved by rewarding staff for their engagement. This can be achieved by offering points to improve their standing on a company leaderboard or badges for each completed level in the course, providing a sense of achievement and friendly competition.
- Employees are more motivated to learn
Gamification of learning in the workplace gives employees the freedom to choose a date to complete training tasks that most suits them. The stress of needing to complete work or rearrange meetings to attend courses on specific days is reduced. As a result, staff have a more positive approach to learning and the motivation to complete the training increases drastically.
- Employees can give and receive feedback
To ensure employees are getting the most out of training and are finding it effective, gamification can be used to give and receive feedback as their targets are achieved in real-time.
By opening this line of communication, employees are more willing to learn and adopt any required improvements to their performance from management.
Through the use of gamification, a major Australian bank was able to receive feedback and gain insight into their employee’s preferred methods of learning.
- Enhance the onboarding experience
The aim of gamification during the onboarding process is to make learning interesting and fun, while giving a great first impression of the organisation. At the same time, it can help to increase the rate at which new hires retain information so they can apply it to their new role and perform well.
Implementing gamification right from the onboarding process will also help with the adoption of gamification as a training method moving forward and sets a precedent on how you expect employees to learn in future.
- Knowledge retention is improved
When game elements are implemented into training, it helps to create high levels of engagement due to the natural change in pace when compared to traditional training methods.
Gamification is a process that can help newly acquired to move from conscious recall into the subconscious, meaning that providing employees with knowledge through game style techniques, will help to improve long term memory and overall retention when linked to a fun experience.