“How do I get my feet wet?”, “Where do I start?”, “How can I work gamification into into my programs?”.

I recently attended a fairly massive learning conference in Orlando and those were some of the questions that made me go hmmm.

So let me quickly start by saying, I’m not in the learning space. Well I didn’t think I was. Social Scavenger is in the mobile engagement space.   But the more and more we see coaches, team builders, educators and the likes using Social Scavenger for learning and training the more it starts to look like we are in the learning space.

So down to Florida to talk with the leaders in the space. See what people really want, need, already have and just hear their stories. Two quick things that stood out:

#1 – Making Good Games is Critical

There were quite a few sessions on Gamification. What are the key elements, do’s and don’ts, some examples of what have worked for one company vs. another etc. The bottom line was you want to understand your objective and make sure the game elements help promote this objective.   Easier said than done, but something you learn over time.

Instead of giving you tips and tricks on great games in a little blog post, I’d be happy to talk to you about what we have seen worked but also refer you to experts in your space who build these types of programs. Just shoot us off an email (info@socialscavenger.com).

#2 – People want a way to get started…NOW

Over and over again, I kept hearing the question ‘how can I get started?’ and ‘how did you sell this to management?’. Probably heard this question in one form or another 25+ times. One of the best responses I heard from a successful panelist was “well actually…we just got started one day…oh, and we didn’t ask”.  The overall feeling was ‘it won’t  be perfect, but you can’t learn until you get going’.

So that got me thinking – hey, we actually have a mobile platform where learning and training professionals can build some game templates right now, try out a program and easily scratch it, update it or vacate altogether – for free!   Free?  Well it’s free to build, test and experiment with.

So to all the people who want to just start, try something and get going, here are just a few ways in which our mobile platform can be easily tested out and used at your company.

 

5 Easy Places to Start Gamifying Your Learning Program Right. Now.

#1 – Orientation and Onboarding Programs – Kicking things off with a pop.  

I got the sense orientation and onboarding programs aren’t the most exciting and dynamic of programs in general, kind of a check list item. Both from the employee and the trainer perspective. This is something important and it has to be done, but it’s often sleep inducing.

So here is an easy place to start with a little Gamification at work. Put people into small teams (2+) and have them play along with the training at pre-defined points of your training. They can do this by answering trivia questions, solving a puzzle, or simply filming a quick video response.

To up the entertainment, why not integrate a video messages into your game. Maybe your CEO has a funny bone?  Either way employees get a chance to engage with the on-boarding process via a memorable mini game companion.   Of course if you have physical space like a campus, there are a variety of actual orientation elements you can include with GPS, QR codes and even Beacons.

You only have one chance to make a first impression, and this is it.  Why not try kicking things off by integrating some mobile engagement?

 

#2 – Scenario Based Training on Mobile

“How do you react in the following situation?” From front line millennials to corporate execs it was clear the traditional e-learning modules are ready for a shakeup. TGIF has thousands of front line employees and went so far as to hire actors, produce videos and create choose your adventure style training. Really innovative, great engagement, but they didn’t build that version of Rome in a day, and it doesn’t tell YOU – how can you get started right now!

So how can you get started easily? Just get started. Build a ‘scenario game’. If you work in Scenario based training you already have some in mind. You can step it up by embedding videos into your scenarios, stick to written, or use a hybrid. Employees simply join your Scenario Game and watch, read and answer each question. Answers can be multiple-choice but why not make some of them video answers? That’s the power of mobile.

All of the content is easy to access, score and control.  You can use these later in a number of ways, from retraining, to using in future scenarios to showing how employees are reacting to the execs in mash up style videos.   Warning:  these can be very powerful visuals.

 

#3 – Team Building Activities

This one is a true no-brainer. Running a Scavenger Hunt, Amazing Race or any other fun themed game is something that happens on our platform every day. We see dancing, singing, unique talents, problem solving, and a lot of smiles as teams work together.

So mix up your teams and let them loose for 60, 90 or 120 minutes to see what they can get done. We’d be happy to help you build a great game, but the platform is also open for you to build the game anyway you see fit!   Just go build a game, try it out, refine it and let them loose!

 

#4 – Cross-Office Training

How often do you get to fly all the associates together? What about your front line people? Once a year? Never? It’s the kind of thing that always gets cut from budgets.

We all know that teams work better together after they have bonded, be it over some in person team meetings, a success or even a painful project. So what if we could bring people together from across offices to work as teams on a learning or problem solving game (of course with fun built in)?  Now we have a chance to get to know our teammates across a nation or globe with some mobile engagement and fun.

When the gaming is done, we aren’t just leaving the content alone. We now have some great photos and videos we are going to use to help bond those new players.

 

#5 – Conference & Retreat Companion

You bring people together for a massive learning, training or strategy session. These are normally super long sessions, where employees are brain dead at the end of the day and bond over some drinks (or other mingling). Realistically we could run a game at the end of the day, that’s fine. But why not integrate it into the training or strategy sessions? One session each group goes through where they join the game, answer questions, solve riddles and use some of what they have learned (or are trying to learn) to get to the top of the leaderboard.

This type of integrated game presents an entirely new way to learn a concept that is being hammered home at a training session, one that is often much easier to retain as it’s engaging.

 

So how do I get started right now?

These are just a few quick ideas. You are a training or learning professional.  You have already thought of a million ways to make things more fun and engaging. We’re just here to answer the question “How can I get started with something…right now!?”.  So go ahead, start building a game right now and test it out.  How?  Head over to app.socialscavenger.com, sign in and click ‘create game’.  Training videos etc are available, it’s free to try out…so what are you waiting for!?

Have fun!