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[Music]
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[Music]
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love to talk to you about your book
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which is titled for the win uh where
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does the title come from for the win is
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a a gamer term uh that that PE it
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usually abbreviated FTW it's it's
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something in games people will say some
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great thing for the win it was
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originally something you had to do to
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get over the top to win an epic kind of
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battle and it's become just sort of a
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commonplace expression just anything you
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want to do that gives you a real
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achievement um and so we thought it it
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echoed um some of these expressions in
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gains but also was very indicative of
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what we're talking about this concept of
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gamification or game thinking as
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something that can actually for
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businesses provide uh epic wins as well
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well it's very interesting because
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though the book is about
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gfic uh the starting point to your book
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is actually the fact that so many
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employees and customers are so utterly
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disengaged today uh now um and and and
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business just isn't as much fun as it
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could be uh what do you think are some
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of the reasons for
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that I'll take that one I mean we've
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sort of assumed that the way that we
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motivate people is through Rewards or
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punishments right and we do that within
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businesses we do that sort of within uh
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the consumer side um there are lots of
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ways of motivating people and we need to
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find new ways of motivating people
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really at the core of it this book is
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about finding ways to do that by relying
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upon some pretty well tested approaches
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to to game design and and what makes
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things fun so what we're really trying
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to do is is to put fun back into all of
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these kinds of areas we've gotten really
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good in business at squeezing out
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operational efficiencies and we have all
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this technology we're in a globalized
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world the the Baseline has been raised
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to the point where just doing those
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things just being efficient isn't a
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differentiator and you think what's the
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differentiator it's human beings it's
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engagement enthusiasm and games we found
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are the key to understanding some of the
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techniques as Dan said to motivating
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people in in powerful and
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differentiating ways so before we go too
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far what exactly is a game and what is
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gamification wow you want to handle
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that so both of those uh I'll take a
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start then maybe you can say like those
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are deeper Concepts than you might think
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in fact there are large dense works of
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philosophy that have been written on
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what is a game um basically a game is
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something that has some rules some
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objective uh and uh involves an attitude
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by players that players care about the
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outcome of the game so it includes
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everything you might think of as a game
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including board games card games Sports
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video games uh but also other kinds of
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experiences that feel game likee where
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there's a set of constraints and you
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care about somehow overcoming those
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constraints so work can be a game school
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can be a game lots of things can be game
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likee and
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gamification is taking what we
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understand about games turns out games
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have been around for tens of thousands
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of years video games uh now are a 40y
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old industry that generates roughly $70
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billion doar a year worldwide and game
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designers have gotten really good at
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understanding what makes those games
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work um learning from those things
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taking those insights from what makes
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games effective what makes people care
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about the outcomes and then translating
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them into business context so how can
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applying the lessons from a a game
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approach or uh introducing game elements
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how can that revolutionize a business
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which is the point that you make early
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on in your book yeah well I mean
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starting off from Kevin's point we can't
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squeeze out any more operational
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efficiency gains from this so so
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basically it's looking at the business
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in a completely different way and saying
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okay so so what are the objectives that
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we have in relation to this business and
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in relation to these business processes
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right and then how can we take these
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these time honored and and now very well
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understood approaches to game design
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right and and apply that to these
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particular Arenas so you know pick any
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given kind of business objective you
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want to increase engagement you know of
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of your customers in relation to say
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your website or something like that okay
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so you actually then rather than saying
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okay we're going to you know pay for
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them to come or we're going to you know
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have prizes or those sorts of things
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we're actually we're going to approach
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this as a as a design problem and say
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all right what's going to motivate them
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you know what sort of playful features
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do people like right understanding your
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users you know and saying okay this
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particular sort of person would like
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this this particular sort of person
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would like that and introducing those
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game elements into the the overall
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design of of the process right now one
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of the things I really loved about your
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book is that you one of the things you
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say is uh that at its core gamification
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is about finding the fun in the things
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that you have to do uh could you uh give
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some examples of how companies like
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Microsoft and deoe have been using this
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approach sure so those are two examples
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we give in the book um the Microsoft one
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uh is a project that came out of the
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test group they the people who do the
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the testing of things like Windows and
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Microsoft Office and one of the problems
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we talked about was that when they were
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releasing Windows 7 Microsoft releases
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it in in dozens of dozens of different
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countries and languages and they have to
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make sure the dialogue boxes work well
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in every one of those languages and even
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Microsoft uh would have a challenge
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hiring companies that have native
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speakers in all of those languages to go
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and sit and look at those dialogue boxes
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but it's really important you don't want
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something to be offensive or incorrect
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that would that would hurt the
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usuability of the applications um so
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what they realized was that they could
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make a game likee experience they
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created a competition for teams of their
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employees their sales offices in these
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different countries to go and find
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errors in the localized dialogue boxes
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and there's no reward uh there was just
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the the thrill of uh finding the most
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problems being good corporate citizens
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and being the most successful office on
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the leaderboard they set up just doing
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that they got uh their employees to
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review half a million dialogue boxes and
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found hundreds and hundreds of bugs
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errors in the localization that hadn't
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been caught in the original translation
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so that's an example of taking something
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that's very mundane very boring no no
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one would say that reading dialogue
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boxes is inherently fun or great it's
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but it's something that they had to do
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for a real legitimate business purpose
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um and that was what we call an internal
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gamification example using it inside the
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Enterprise as opposed to outside for
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customers the deoe one you mentioned was
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about uh Knowledge Management about
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getting their Consultants to describe
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what they're working on and what they
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know about which is incredibly important
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task for lots of organizations
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especially Professional Services
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organizations by creating a little bit
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of competition and a little bit of fun
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through an internal application they got
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much greater participation in that
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information sharing and in the book we
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go through examples in all sorts of
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areas gamification is not just something
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for teeny little startups or for youth
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oriented sexy kinds of companies it's
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something that AC applies across the
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board you distinguish in the book
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between internal and external
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gamification how how is external
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gamification different well I mean it's
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it still uses the same principles but
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basically you're you're focused on on
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issues outside of the company so you
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know the internal one of things like HR
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or the examples that that Kevin gave in
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relation to Microsoft and deoe external
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you know typically the marketing kinds
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of Arenas so so we're thinking about
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things like Salesforce at the really
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high end um and at the at the lower end
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you other sorts of examples like um Club
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site uh which was a which was a website
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that was gamified for for USA networks
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um and and those ones are really about
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trying to improve the the user and
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customer experience um trying to to
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drive revenue and those sorts of things
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outside of the Enterprise so it's really
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just a useful distinction between the
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the different sort of elements or the
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different sort of approaches that you
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face inside the Enterprise and outside
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the Enterprise what does it mean to
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think like a game designer MH and how do
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can companies uh use that kind of
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thinking to do some of the things that
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you're describing yeah so this ties into
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a point that Dan made earlier which is
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really critical we look at gamification
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as a design challenge um so it's part of
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design more broadly and there there have
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been other authors and Scholars and
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practitioners who've written about
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design thinking and and this in some way
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is a special case of that broad approach
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but it's a special case that's important
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uh game design is its own discipline uh
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major video games cost tens of millions
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of dollars and bring in in some cases
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billions of dollars of Revenue so it's a
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a fairly sophisticated and
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well-developed discipline thinking like
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a game designer means attacking problems
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through the lens of creating an
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experience for players and the primary
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challenges of a game designer are one
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get people playing and two keep them
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playing and if you start to think about
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your business challenges that way you
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think about your participants as players
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they are voluntarily participating in
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something because they want to because
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they get value and enjoyment and
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fulfillment out of it and find ways to
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get them in and then once they're in
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find ways to keep them interested to
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create a player Journey if you will that
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remains valuable as they get to higher
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levels of the experience you start to
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create a kind of environment that is
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inherently engaging and in the book we
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go through lots of specific Frameworks
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and Concepts that there's a lot more
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detail than that but that's the basic
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approach to to think about what you're
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doing as creating an experience for a
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group of players that they find valuable
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I mean if I can just jump in there the
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the reason that we we sat down to write
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this book um was that we looked at at
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the other sorts of approaches that were
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out there and and basically everyone was
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saying oh look gamification it's this
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huge interesting fascinating incredibly
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important thing that you should do and
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the way you do it is just just slap
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badges on this or put points on anything
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right and and those those those
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approaches fail right I mean and and
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we'd seen them fail and we were sort of
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looking at it and saying well why do
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they fail um and and we sort of sat back
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and said okay so if you approach this in
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the way of a game designer and try to
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understand you know what it is that the
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players want and actually go through
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this entire process that we outline in
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the book then you can actually build an
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experience that's engaging um and that
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people will keep coming back to because
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it's fun and at the same time Drive
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revenue or do all of the sorts of things
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that you need for your business process
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um we we found that there was really
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just nothing out there that was a sort
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of a guideline along those along that
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those sort of lines so so that was
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really the motivation for the book to
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sort of think as as a game designer
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without being a game designer you know
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we absolutely don't want people to be a
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game designer at the end of this we're
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simply saying look if you approach it
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this way you'll actually generate these
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these really useful compelling
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experiences for your users so let's say
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there's an executive who's facing a
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business problem
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how does she or he know whether
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gamification is the right solution for
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that problem buy the book first
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right and yeah and it's very engaging
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and well written and um uh but but no I
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mean what they they need to do is sort
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of try to work out what is the actual
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process that they're they're looking to
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gamify what's the objective out of all
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of this you know what do they need to do
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right and then they go through the steps
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in the book and they'll actually have
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within a very short space of time a kind
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of an idea about um what it is that
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gamification can give them at the end of
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this of this experience I mean not every
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not every business objective you know
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can be can be gamified there there are
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lots of ones that are just not going to
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work because your your you know
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customers or your players are not going
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to be engaged they're not going to be
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interested in it um or that there's a
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mismatch right you know that the the
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nature of the activity um is so serious
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that that you know introducing game
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elements is going to make the the the
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player or the user think hang on what's
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this doesn't make any sense um so you
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have have to think carefully about that
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and and that's really what the book's
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about yeah there's a matrix in the book
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which is a little too detailed to get
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into here but the starting point is
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motivation so if you're a business
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manager you say let's say I could wave a
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magic W and get this population whether
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they're my customers potential customers
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employees this group to be more
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motivated would that really drive a
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business benefit in some Metric I care
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about in my business and there's
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sometimes where it wouldn't either
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because it's something that shouldn't be
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made fun or it's something where
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motivation would get people to be more
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excited but wouldn't drive purchases or
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efficiency or anything you care about um
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that's the starting point is this
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something where if I can successfully
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build something that motivates uh it
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would be a real and Lasting benefit to
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my business and then once you answer
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that question then you you think about
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how to design using some of the steps
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that Dan talked about to ensure that the
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system You're Building would in fact
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produce those motivational benefits yeah
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the section on motivation is one of the
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ones that I found really fascinating in
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your book and and uh you know one of the
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things that you distinguish there is
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what you call intrinsic motivation and
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extrinsic motivation could you explain
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for our audience how the two are
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different and how they can uh you know
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motivate people differently uh to alter
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their behavior I could go first although
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I mean Dan Dan did some of his PhD work
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in um psychology and and artificial
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intelligence so part of uh the reason
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that we we felt that we were well
00:13:24
situated to put this book together was
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that we had an understanding of the
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different p pieces the game design is
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one piece the psychology is another
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piece the business aspects are another
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piece um intrinsic and extrinsic
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motivations are wellestablished terms in
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the literature on the psychology of
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motivation primarily from a set of
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theories called selfdetermination Theory
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which was developed by uh Ed Desi and
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Richard Ryan at the University of
00:13:49
Rochester it's a very well-established
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uh theory about what motivates people
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backed by dozens and dozens of empirical
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studies and the basic idea is is you can
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be motivated by something external to
00:14:01
you something outside of yourself it's
00:14:03
not something that you inherently want
00:14:05
to do but you do it because you get paid
00:14:09
you do it because you care about what
00:14:11
other people think you want you want
00:14:12
status from other people you do it
00:14:15
because you need to finish this unit in
00:14:17
order to get to something else you care
00:14:18
about to get a promotion your job
00:14:19
whatever else extrinsic motivation
00:14:22
intrinsic motivation is if none of that
00:14:24
were there you would still do it you
00:14:26
want to do it for its own sake and the
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lesson from self-determination Theory
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there there many lessons but one of the
00:14:32
key ones is that extrinsic motivation
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works but it's dangerous that if you
00:14:38
take topics and and areas that are
00:14:40
inherently interesting to people and
00:14:43
substitute external rewards they can
00:14:46
actually um crowd out as it's called the
00:14:49
intrinsic motivation and um that's a
00:14:52
danger in any context it's a real danger
00:14:54
in gamification because as Dan said
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people tend to think about gamification
00:14:58
as just these shiny Rewards well just
00:15:00
give people these points and badges and
00:15:02
so forth and that can work that's why
00:15:05
frequent flyer programs work it's why
00:15:07
compensation systems work in business
00:15:08
and so forth and that's part of
00:15:10
gamification um but you need to
00:15:12
understand the limits of it and not
00:15:14
create a system where those things make
00:15:17
it so that people feel sort of
00:15:19
subconsciously this isn't something fun
00:15:21
this isn't something I'd want to do I'll
00:15:22
just do it as long as you give me stuff
00:15:24
and pay me um what you want is a system
00:15:27
that gets to the point where people feel
00:15:28
like in a great game this is fun I want
00:15:31
to do this I feel validated in this
00:15:34
experience and and it's something that
00:15:36
that potentially gives me that that
00:15:37
sense of a win and there's also I mean
00:15:39
if you think about intrinsic motivation
00:15:41
about uh within business you know and
00:15:43
and all of the sort of recent management
00:15:45
theories which take your pick right
00:15:47
about how to get people to do things how
00:15:49
to make a better workplace how to ensure
00:15:52
you know that for for better profits
00:15:54
better Roi whatever it happens to be
00:15:56
these the sort of the recent Trends have
00:15:57
been towards intrinsic motivation right
00:16:00
rather than sort of assuming that the
00:16:01
way that we're going to do this is is to
00:16:03
you know try to squeeze more out of out
00:16:05
of the individuals it's really about
00:16:06
sort trying to understand them what
00:16:08
they're doing say within you know within
00:16:09
an HR context as one example um and so
00:16:13
so the sort of the chapter on on
00:16:14
intrinsic and extrinsic motivation is
00:16:17
really trying to get um the the manager
00:16:19
to think about what it is that that that
00:16:22
people want right and then how can we
00:16:24
build systems in this case G you know
00:16:26
game likee systems that actually will be
00:16:28
be compelling and interesting and and be
00:16:31
the sort of environment where people
00:16:32
will look up and say wow I just wasted
00:16:34
an hour um you know and and I was
00:16:37
working you know and that's and that's
00:16:38
really where where we we were trying to
00:16:39
get to at the end of the end of the book
00:16:42
you also offer uh companies a toolkit
00:16:45
that they can use if they are interested
00:16:47
in uh gamification could you tell us
00:16:49
about some of those tools that companies
00:16:51
can use um so the so the toolkit I mean
00:16:54
are you talking about each of the
00:16:55
different game elements that that that
00:16:56
you can sort of um build into these
00:16:58
systems well what we you know we put
00:17:00
that actually sort of in the middle of
00:17:01
the book rather than at the beginning of
00:17:03
the book um because what we wanted to do
00:17:05
was to to make it clear that the toolkit
00:17:07
doesn't make any sense unless you
00:17:09
understand the overall process right so
00:17:10
so by about halfway through you're at
00:17:12
the stage you know and it's not you know
00:17:14
halfway through is what 40 50 pages into
00:17:16
the book um is you've got the sort of
00:17:18
the point at which you can say okay here
00:17:20
are the sorts of elements that we might
00:17:22
be able to use in this particular
00:17:24
environment and and those elements are
00:17:26
are pretty pretty obvious if you think
00:17:28
of it in game term I mean think of any
00:17:29
game or sport that you've played I mean
00:17:30
there's elements like like teamwork and
00:17:33
cooperation there are elements like
00:17:34
maybe scoring there are elements like
00:17:36
you know success states there are sort
00:17:38
of like these big challenges that you
00:17:40
know might be this final push you know a
00:17:42
sort of like a full-court press in in
00:17:43
basketball terms you know which which
00:17:45
you know in video game terms would be a
00:17:47
boss fight or something like that right
00:17:48
so there's so there's all of these these
00:17:50
sort of um aspects which can get built
00:17:52
into um any gamified process and and so
00:17:56
what we we provide is kind of like this
00:17:58
this definition and these steps to
00:18:00
understand how these things fit together
00:18:02
in a framework and and a hierarchy so
00:18:05
that the the manager can can go about
00:18:07
Building Systems that actually use those
00:18:09
features you also recommend six steps
00:18:12
that companies can take to build uh
00:18:14
effective gamification programs could
00:18:16
you take us through some of them only go
00:18:18
through four can have to buy the book
00:18:21
yeah that's right three that's right
00:18:23
well there'll be a bonus step that
00:18:24
they'll they'll get if you buy the book
00:18:26
while you're watching this video then
00:18:27
you'll get another one step so we call
00:18:29
them the 6ds um and they are um six
00:18:33
element of gamification design um now
00:18:36
design is not a linear process and and
00:18:38
we talk about this in the context of
00:18:39
design thinking and and game thinking um
00:18:42
it's iterative you go through and go
00:18:45
back you have to play test and so forth
00:18:47
um but these are steps that are
00:18:48
essential to to think about to make sure
00:18:50
that you don't ignore um and it starts
00:18:53
with um defining objectives which is
00:18:55
what Dan talked about earlier what is my
00:18:57
goal here um because your goal is
00:19:01
probably not to get people to earn
00:19:03
points or to get people to show up at
00:19:06
your website that that might be a an
00:19:08
intermediate goal um but but your goal
00:19:11
is maybe to get more conversions to
00:19:13
people to be customers or to get your
00:19:15
your customers to be engaged more um
00:19:18
whatever it is you as a manager know
00:19:19
what your business goal is then you
00:19:21
break that down into specific behaviors
00:19:24
what are the activities you want people
00:19:25
to do in the gamified system um and then
00:19:28
you drill down on your players who who
00:19:30
are these people what do you know about
00:19:31
them how do you model them think about
00:19:34
um their methods of Engagement and so
00:19:35
forth um so that that gets you down to
00:19:38
the specifics um and then from there you
00:19:40
can go on to the further steps and uh
00:19:42
model the the specific uh activities
00:19:46
what we call activity Cycles within your
00:19:48
gamified system the specific uh tools
00:19:52
that you employ the game elements that
00:19:54
Dan talked about um and um the the
00:19:57
critical one uh the is the next to last
00:19:59
one which is don't forget the fun
00:20:02
because what we found Dan and I taught
00:20:04
the first gamification course as far as
00:20:06
we know the first one ever offered um at
00:20:08
the Wharton School last year and we're
00:20:09
teaching it again this year um what we
00:20:12
found was that it's so easy to lose the
00:20:14
forest for the trees um you start to go
00:20:17
down this design process and you have to
00:20:19
constantly pull yourself back up and say
00:20:21
would someone want to do that um because
00:20:24
that's a critical question and that's
00:20:25
the essential question you can't just do
00:20:27
that you can't just say gee this looks
00:20:28
like fun and we're done you need to be
00:20:29
systematic and thoughtful and model and
00:20:31
do analytics and so forth um but you
00:20:34
need to keep bouncing back between those
00:20:36
things and a sense of the experience a
00:20:39
sense of this is something people would
00:20:40
want to do so the 6ds are are basically
00:20:43
a a structured framework to ensure you
00:20:46
look at all of those aspects and the
00:20:48
things that people generally start with
00:20:50
in gamification again going back to the
00:20:51
point Dan made earlier um just you know
00:20:53
spilling out the blocks as it were and
00:20:55
sticking them together that's all near
00:20:57
the end um because if you do that
00:20:59
without a really good sense of your
00:21:02
objectives and who your players are
00:21:04
you're going to fail or you're going to
00:21:06
succeed for a little while and then fail
00:21:07
which in some ways may be even worse and
00:21:09
and you won't know why you failed right
00:21:11
it looked like it was great but then it
00:21:12
really wasn't what are some of the big
00:21:14
risks and dangers of gamification and
00:21:17
how how do you think companies should
00:21:19
avoid them yeah um I mean there is there
00:21:21
there a combination of them there sort
00:21:23
of there are some legal risks um there
00:21:25
are some ethical risks um and there are
00:21:27
some risks
00:21:29
which are really mostly in the nature of
00:21:31
um just bad gamification design right so
00:21:33
so the legal risks you know are not are
00:21:35
not that serious but but there are ones
00:21:37
that you have to you know look out for
00:21:39
things like um you know sweep Stakes
00:21:41
rules or competition rules that you
00:21:43
might have in your particular state or
00:21:44
jurisdiction um there are some some
00:21:47
ethical risks that can can occur um that
00:21:50
we we kind of outline in the book um
00:21:52
those examples are where where people
00:21:54
are compelled to play your game um then
00:21:58
it can end up being something which
00:22:00
which is really sort of Bad Business
00:22:01
practice really sort of unethical
00:22:03
Behavior or behavior that's going to end
00:22:05
up subjecting you to to sort of some
00:22:07
some problems whether it's you know PR
00:22:09
or some some issues with with the the
00:22:11
workforce um so you know an example of
00:22:13
that is is is using leaderboards um to
00:22:16
try to speed up people's workflow right
00:22:18
and and showing that you know that the
00:22:20
Dan is really great at this but Kevin is
00:22:22
really bad and so that will not only
00:22:24
demotivate Kevin um but it you know it
00:22:26
has some some real ethical concerns and
00:22:28
so you can't just apply that in in the
00:22:30
normal way um uh you know in the sense
00:22:32
of sort of like there's no problem here
00:22:33
um and then the final sort of category
00:22:35
are some some risks in relation to just
00:22:37
bad gamification design where um you end
00:22:40
up more than anything else just just
00:22:42
wasting money you know it's just it's
00:22:44
just going to fail as a as a process and
00:22:46
and so why would you start it and so
00:22:48
those are the the risk we outline at the
00:22:49
end of the book so for each of you do
00:22:51
you have any final words of advice for
00:22:53
companies that are eag eager to use
00:22:55
gamification to motivate their employees
00:22:58
and engage their customers well one of
00:23:00
the interesting things that that we
00:23:01
found as we started to research the book
00:23:03
was we started to come upon all of these
00:23:05
examples that were already out there
00:23:07
that companies weren't necessarily
00:23:09
thinking about gamification um or there
00:23:12
were things that people would look at
00:23:14
and say were gamification like for
00:23:15
example frequent flyer and loyalty
00:23:17
programs uh that turned out to either
00:23:20
not really be gamification or be just
00:23:22
bad gamification because they don't have
00:23:24
that focus on game design and fun and
00:23:26
engagement um so it turns out that just
00:23:30
as if you go into a room of business
00:23:31
Executives or professionals and say
00:23:33
who's a gamer about you know one in 10
00:23:36
or one in 12 people will raise their
00:23:37
hand uh and then you start to ask all
00:23:39
right well how many of you play Angry
00:23:41
Birds or Farmville or one of these games
00:23:43
that have now literally billions of
00:23:45
players around the world when more hands
00:23:46
go up how many of you play golf chess
00:23:49
Checkers Bridge poker uh we're all
00:23:52
Gamers uh and so businesses need to
00:23:56
realize that this is not just about
00:23:58
about how to uh plate the kids that want
00:24:01
to be you shooting and killing dragons
00:24:03
all the time instead of doing their job
00:24:06
um this is about uh taking some very old
00:24:10
very established insights psychology and
00:24:12
design and so forth um and applying them
00:24:15
in new ways given the new capabilities
00:24:16
of Technology we now have a concept we
00:24:19
have a word for it and we have these
00:24:20
extraordinary capabilities of digital
00:24:22
platforms and analytic systems to manage
00:24:26
and Implement gamification so I would
00:24:28
urge companies to to to have that kind
00:24:30
of Broad View because it turns out that
00:24:33
most of them the ones we talk to when
00:24:34
they start to look around they realize
00:24:37
they're already doing this they're just
00:24:38
not doing it thoughtfully and
00:24:39
systematically um the the advice that I
00:24:42
would have is is that I think that the
00:24:43
games of the future of many businesses
00:24:46
right every manager needs to understand
00:24:48
the gainful thinking um but the main
00:24:50
piece of advice would be by the
00:24:53
book thank you both for joining us
00:24:55
pleasure thank you so much
00:25:00
[Music]
