Gamification strategies can be an incredible tool for engaging employees, reinforcing changes in behavior, and providing incentives for best practices — which is why Bluewolf invests in gamification. Some incredible tools enable integrating gamification into the Salesforce environment, including Bunchball Nitro and Badgeville Behavior Platform. In any successful gamification strategy, it is crucial to establish clear expectations and communicate the positive results from participating.

The key to creating and implementing a successful gamification program? Promote positivity. As you set up each scenario for gamification, ask yourself: “Am I incentivizing colleagues toward positive reward, or forcing them to participate in order to avoid a negative consequence?” Not surprisingly, experience shows that positive rewards foster engagement and alignment around shared goals. In contrast, when people feel obliged to “play a game” simply to avoid negative responses, it not only works against engagement, but can also be perceived as manipulation instead of motivation, thereby producing lingering resentment that undermines morale.

Accentuate the Positive

As with all change management initiatives, adoption depends on stakeholders’ understanding and catering to employees’ “What’s In It For Me” mentality, or WIIFMs. Here are our rules for a winning gamification program:

• Lead with a positive message.
  Remember, the goal is to motivate, not to shame for non-participation. Communicating a shared vision for success is essential to foster collaboration, build a sense of community, and, ultimately, encourage long-term engagement.
• Clearly articulate expectations and success criteria.
  To ensure the universal adoption of your gamification program, make sure that both success criteria and rewards are relevant to each group in your organization.
• Track success by monitoring feedback.
  Establish a channel for candid feedback from your employees and clients about success criteria, challenges, point system, and rewards.

Bluewolf has helped organizations around the world with change management, as well as employee and customer engagement through gamification and social strategies. We also run a gamification program called #GoingSocial, which is geared towards social sharing, knowledge sharing, and helping to build each employee’s professional brand. To learn more about our approach to gamification and change management, contact us to connect with one of our social collaboration experts.