Should you Gamify your Simulations?

I have read several books on #Gamification and found them either touting the use of rewards and badges or the technical aspect of design. I never did find that middle ground until I read, The Gamification of Learning and Instruction by Dr. Karl Kapp. The book started with the basics (it’s not about rewards, games and badges) giving me a true understanding of games and maybe more importantly gamers. He then proceeded to get into just enough technical detail so that I would be able to communicate and participate in the creation process with a designer.

Many other books use examples such as frequent flyer programs and other reward schemes that have already been used for decades. Dr. Kapp starts with why anyone wants to use Gamification – Engagement! He goes on to create a learning experience that gives you the basic understanding for both an instructor trying to learn or create a game and the designer who is trying to understand how to construct a game. He marvelously constructs a bridge between the two disciplines.

Dr. Kapp’s examples are current and readily applied to the real world. After reading the book, you feel that not only do you understand the Gaming world better, but you are much more willing to take a stab at trying a few games on your own. Something the author recommends that we all do if we are serious about Gamification. I have already purchased two copies of the book sending the hard copy to a client and a Kindle version for me to use as a reference tool no matter where I may be. An excerpt from next week’s Tuesday podcast, and I will forewarn you; it is a long podcast.

Joe: Many of my listeners have been running simulations and board games as trainers for a long time. Do we need to be upgrading our skills? Have you converted any of these old simulations, to present‑day Gamification methods?

Karl: “Yes, two things about that. One, Gamification doesn't always necessarily have to mean technology. Technology certainly enables it to happen, so creating it like a just‑in‑time board game, for example, is a great example of Gamification. Creating a simulation to teach a buyer how to buy product or how to place a product, I think that's an element of Gamification.

What is really happening now is that a lot of times we felt those were good ways to go, and we thought they worked well, but now we have some empirical evidence that shows that Gamification actually does drive engagement. To be on the front end of what's happening and understanding how that works, we really need to upgrade our skills. We also need to understand there are a lot of people out there that do not like Gamification. In fact, there's visceral response is negative to the term Gamification.

I think one game designer famously wrote a blog post, Gamification is B.S. Nobody should do Gamification; I can't believe anybody's doing that. I think what he missed was the fact that it really translates into engagement. A lot of training and development folks have been creating engagement, but now the engagement is going to a different level. For example, we're completing a workflow on order entry or on the shop floor, or you're trying to get people to enter their hours.

Are there engagement techniques that you can use to help these people focus on what they already should be doing? Is there ways to help them see the value of what they're doing in a different perspective, framing it differently?

I think there is a need to upgrade the skills and think about what Gamification is. Some of the things we've done before, some of the new things that we're doing, and also new combinations of what we're doing, which really makes this a very powerful tool for encouraging learners to be involved, engaged and activated.

What I like most about it, is the thought process. Game developers go through such a different thought process than people designing instruction. If we get instructional designers to go through that thought process, I think they can make some really powerful instructional elements and interactions. That's the concept behind the book.”

About: Karl Kapp is a professor of instructional technology at Bloomsburg University in Pennsylvania. He teaches a variety of courses to include game design and how to design learning courses and environments, Additionally, as the assistant director of Bloomsburg's acclaimed Institute for Interactive Technologies (IIT), Dr. Kapp helps government, corporate, and non-profit organizations leverage learning technologies for employee productivity and organizational profitability. In his spare time, he has authored or co-authored four books on the convergence of learning and technology with his latest being The Gamification of Learning and Instruction.

You can find Karl on Twitter @kKapp  or his blog, Kapp Notes.

This podcast will serve as a great introduction to Paul Myerson discussing his Lean Supply Chain & Logistics Simulation later in the week. This is part of a series of blog posts outlined in A Lean Service Design Approach to Gaming your Training.