Playing virtual games in the workplace
by Mike Schramm 
Oct 23rd 2007 at 2:31PM
We've heard before about how different activities in World of Warcraft can actually help you be better at your job, but now the BBC has posted an article examining how game mechanics from games like WoW can actually help your company help you work better. According to the ESRB, the average gamer isn't a teen after school any more-- he's 33 and has been gaming for 10 years. And because so many more professionals nowadays know the basics of gaming, employers are starting to apply those rules to the workplace to make everyone more productive.One mechanic used is a form of "virtual currency" in terms of emails and meeting time-- send an email or hold a 15 minute meeting, and it costs you a token, while tokens can be earned in all kinds of ways. Not only does it keep employees on task, but it adds an extra layer of strategy and thought to the normal workday. Another game mechanic used by employers, says the BBC, is the idea of guilds and leveling rewards. "Guilds" in the workplace are tracked along a point system, and the best guilds get the best projects and rewards.
Very interesting stuff. While it sounds like good news for employers, I'm not sure how successful ideas like this would actually be among non-gamer employees-- at some point, how good you are at your job would be determined not by your industry ability, but by your game-playing ability, and that doesn't seem like a good outcome. But if employers find employees are willing to use these mechanics to make themselves more productive, everyone could benefit.
Thanks, Lienn!
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Odds and ends, News items, Leveling, Making money
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Rich Oct 23rd 2007 2:36PM
I saw the title and thought it was about playing games at work. Not that me and a co worker bring the xbox into the conference room and hook it up to the projector to play Halo.
nativebrown Oct 23rd 2007 2:57PM
I've been employing WoW tactics at work for years now.
Vanish....Backstab
Rihlsul Oct 23rd 2007 3:06PM
Hmm... shouldn't there be a link to said BBS article?
Rihlsul Oct 23rd 2007 3:06PM
Hmm... shouldn't there be a link to said BBC article?
Alex Oct 23rd 2007 3:19PM
This is completely and absolutely ridiculous. An egg is an egg. The statement, "this is an egg, and the whole concept of an egg comes from virtual worlds," would be known as a "lie," or "stupid," in some dialects. So the big idea here is that...you earn something by doing something...which you can then spend? I hate to break it to you, but this is NOT AN IDEA FROM GAMING. Employers have been doing this..well..forever. It's called a salary. Now, the fact that they've created an incentive system within the workplace itself (also not new AT ALL), is nothing worth writing about, except some twit who can barely rub three brain cells together decided that they got the idea from gaming, and some other twit decided it was actually something worth writing about.
vektra Oct 23rd 2007 3:35PM
My employer keeps telling me there is cake, but I have yet to see it...
braydn Oct 23rd 2007 3:44PM
i thought this article was just fine, interesting to think about...gamers have shared experiences and terminologies, so doing this kind of thing in the workplace can create instant comradery and make better teams, as long as everyone has exposure to the same gamer culture.
and to #5...did you even read the article? it seems like you had some other emotions to vent that were very loosely based on the article.
the article never mentioned anything about earning and spending. it did mention virtual currency, which is what your tiny brain got over excited about. the whole idea of this article had little to do with virtual earning and spending.
it was simply about a generation of people, myself included, that are part of gaming culture being motivated by gaming ideas and terminology in the real-life workplace. it makes perfect sense.
non-gamers would have no reference to draw from and would not be as pre-conditioned to accept or understand or be motivated by a game mechanic they have know nothing about. but gamers on the other hand would theoretically be more motivated by something they understand from outside the workplace. and both gamers and non-gamers could still succeed, whether this mechanic was used or not.
it is more of a generational thing than a matter of whether motivational systems have been in place previously or not. if you put a non-gamer in WoW and make them play the game even if they don't like it much but it pays well, that is a boring job. but if you put a gamer into the boring workplace with gamer-derived cultural motivations, it becomes more game like, hence more pyschologically more fun and enjoyable, at least in some minimum way.
so please, if you have a complaint about the article, make sure it directly deals with explicit and specific ideas in the artlicle, not some loosely derived tangent of an idea you wanted to bitch about.
Alex Oct 23rd 2007 4:25PM
@7...fail. I did read the article quite carefully, and your clear inability to think abstractly is what is hurting you. *everyone* understands the gaming mechanic. Name me one "mmorpg gaming mechanic," mentioned inside the article, or otherwise, that would fail because of a generational issue. There are two mechanics mentioned in the wowinsider writeup, one is virtual currency - employers have used a virtual currency system (you earn "something" by doing work, which you then use to get stuff that will do your work better) forever. Sometimes, they even use real currency for it! The second mechanic mentioned is a guild, leveling system. Again, I see nothing new here. A team is tracked as a unit, they get points, they get the best rewards and projects? Again, this has been happening forever. What is new?
If you feel strongly that it is merely the terminology used that will motivate people, and not the concept, that's fine - I strongly disagree, but have only observational data on the subject. Or if the argument is that the rise in popularity of mmorpgs will make the deployment of these systems "easier" in the office, which in turn will lead to an increase in productivity, because they are good systems, then fine.
My issue is when people see "new concepts," or frankly *anything* of pure intellectual value arising from online gaming. It is becoming increasingly easy to forget that online worlds are modeling something else, and are constructed (as they must), by ideas and philosophies that exist OUTSIDE the system. While this may create a laboratory in which real new value is bred, there is also a real danger of claiming value exists where in fact it's something else simply repainted.
The Castronova book, lauded as "genre defining" in the study of virtual worlds, for example, suffers greatly from this problem.
So much in life already functions according to "game mechanics," let's not forget that at a conceptual level, there isn't all that much new in the mmorpg genre. The medium, availability, and terminology - sure those all might be different.
Also, I will honor any kind of reasonable bet that my IQ is far far higher than yours, and that I will outperform you on any intelligence metric (barring something job specific that I wouldn't know about). Kindly do not take to personal insulting unless you are sure you are smarter than me, in which case clearly you have the right.
Grayen Oct 23rd 2007 4:50PM
@5 and 8
Alex, please, vent some steam, then come back in. In the vastness of your intelligence, which I'm sure is just as you describe, realize that not everyone is at your level. Let some of us muddle along and share ideas that are already passe to you.
Game theory and meta game discussions are the bread and butter of this site. The fact that games are being taken more seriously by business types is news. If you want to have an argument about who thought of these ideas first, go ahead, but at the very least, make your comments shorter. Don't pass your headache on to me.
Thijz Oct 23rd 2007 4:49PM
I have to agree with Alex. Stuff like that doesn't originate from games, it's been around for ages...
Grayen Oct 23rd 2007 4:53PM
Also, Alex, did you seriously challenge somebody to an IQ bet?
How does one take oneself seriously after that?
braydn Oct 23rd 2007 5:24PM
hehe, alex, to quote you word for word, "an egg is and egg", that doesn't sound like abstract thinking to me, you're obviously a raving idiot. QQ somewhere else please.
Ryan Murphy Oct 23rd 2007 6:50PM
Alex:
Intelligent trolling is still trolling, tool.
Respond and prove it, or go do something unproductive somewhere else where it's also unwanted.
Thumbs down, either way.
Sky_Paladin Oct 23rd 2007 8:19PM
@Alex;
"Also, I will honor any kind of reasonable bet that my IQ is far far higher than yours, and that I will outperform you on any intelligence metric (barring something job specific that I wouldn't know about). Kindly do not take to personal insulting unless you are sure you are smarter than me, in which case clearly you have the right."
Being more intelligent than another doesn't give you the right to insult them. With knowledge comes power, and with power comes responsibility. There are many kinds of power. Physical strength of arms, intellectual wealth, the power of command... You don't realise it, but you are saying 'might makes right'. What you do with that is up to you, but would you really take crap from someone just because they scored higher than you on an IQ test? I certainly wouldn't. If I am in an argument and I am wrong, I will learn from my mistake and become a better person for it. But I will never accept "I am smarter than you/stronger than you" as a reason for surrendering without a fight, and you shouldn't either.
Your comments and points should be able to stand on their own logical basis and merit. If they can't, how can you be sure others will appreciate them? You may be smart, but you still need to learn about communicating effectively with other people. Even the most powerful person can't live alone forever.
aisenfaire Oct 24th 2007 12:24AM
Link to two related BBS articles:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3247595.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7030234.stm
J Oct 24th 2007 3:52PM
@12
L2quote. Nowhere did he ever say "an egg is and egg." You probably shouldn't call people idiots, after making a mistake and misquoting someone.
Maid Marian Oct 25th 2007 3:48AM
an interesting read...IBM funded study re: MMORPGs and leadership
http://www.seriosity.com/leadership.html