Continuous corporate training is strategic for gaining a competitive advantage over competitors and keeping employees up-to-date and efficient. However, the usual lessons, videos, and slides are often ineffective: a TalentLMS study shows that for 61% of employees, training is dramatically ineffective if materials and activities are perceived as monotonous and boring.
This is why, in recent years, more and more companies are including “gamification” elements in their e-learning processes. So how can you apply gamification to your internal training? What are the best tools for creating interactive materials? And how can you measure the impact of gamification in corporate training?
At WhoTeach, we provide innovative and professional Digital Learning solutions. We are well aware of the importance of making training effective and engaging: read this article to the end and discover everything about gamification in your company!
Gamification: What Role Does It Play in Corporate Training?
“Gamification” is the application of typical game elements, such as competition and rewards, to non-game contexts, with the aim of improving user performance and motivation.
It is based on the psychology of learning, which studies how people understand, remember, and apply information. These concepts are valid for people of all ages and professions and can be effectively applied to all training contexts, including corporate training, to make learning effective and improve results.
Gamification has been recognized since the 1980s, when studies such as “Toward a Theory of Intrinsically Motivating Instruction” showed that including attractive graphics, progressive challenges, and rewarding incentives stimulates student engagement. People act out of “intrinsic motivation” when they engage in an activity without the need for external rewards, such as money or additional benefits, simply because they feel gratified by the activity itself. The goal of gamification is to stimulate motivation and participant engagement—the “drivers” of learning—through a high degree of personalization and fun.
Applying these concepts to learning is fundamental, especially in the context of digital training, to encourage users to actively participate and persist in educational activities.
In fact, according to a 2019 TalentLMS study on Gamification in business processes, 90% of employees believe that gamification would make them more productive and happier at work. Moreover, among workers who receive “gamified” training, 83% feel more motivated.
Not only that: companies can increase the effectiveness of training programs and better monitor employee progress. Accurately reporting the results of a training course is necessary to verify its efficiency and ensure that the goals set by managers and HR are achieved.
For example, a corporate safety training course can include videos, interactive quizzes, and practical simulations to increase the level of experience.
With gamification strategies specifically designed by e-learning experts like us at WhoTeach, companies can turn training into a more rewarding and productive process, improving employee skills and satisfaction.
Benefits of Gamification in Corporate Training
Numerous studies confirm the benefits of gamification on Corporate Training.
The results are more than positive: as we have already seen, among companies that adopt this strategy, 83% see a significant improvement in performance and an increase of over 40% in student motivation compared to a standard training course.
Moreover, completion rates for training programs increase by 50% when gamification strategies are present, so students are more encouraged to continue training to the end and with greater attention.
But completion alone is not enough to guarantee the effectiveness of corporate training. In this sense, research from the Hanoi University of Science and Technology (Pham, 2022) analyzed the effects of gamification on memory and found that more interactive and engaging activities increase the likelihood of students remembering key terms by 30%.
All these factors contribute to the overall success of the organization compared to competitors, but also in terms of internal cohesion, competence, and employee adaptability.
How to Implement Gamification in Your Company?
Okay, defining your goals and designing game mechanics is important, but now you need to effectively implement these strategies with the right technologies.
What technologies can facilitate the creation of effective gamified content?
H5P
H5P, short for HTML5 Package, is a free and open-source technology that allows you to create interactive content directly from your browser. It is supported on platforms such as Moodle, WordPress, and Drupal and allows you to easily create, share, and edit HTML5 content without the need for advanced technical skills or additional software.
Gamification in corporate training courses involves using game elements to make learning more engaging. H5P facilitates this process by allowing you to create interactive content such as videos, presentations, and quizzes that make courses more dynamic and stimulating. These tools increase participation and improve learning through direct interaction and immediate feedback.
xAPI
xAPI, also known as Experience API, is a standard protocol for recording and tracking learning experiences across different training systems. Its goal is to facilitate the collection, tracking, and sharing of data regarding user learning and performance.
This technology enables smooth integration and interoperability between different components of a Learning and Development ecosystem, such as an LMS, a CMS, and a virtual classroom system, as well as other systems.
The data collected provides a detailed overview of the learning experience, such as when and how often users access educational material, as well as how they interact with the various available resources. xAPI can be very useful in the context of gamification to monitor the effectiveness of training programs and personalize employee learning based on individual needs, as well as to monitor the effectiveness of the techniques used and the investment.
SCORM
SCORM, which stands for Sharable Content Object Reference Model, is a standard used in the e-learning world to ensure that online educational content can work on different learning platforms. Think of SCORM as a kind of “universal language” that allows programs and courses to communicate with each other, regardless of where they were created or where they are used.
For example, if a company creates a training course in SCORM, it can be uploaded to any SCORM-compatible learning platform, such as Moodle or Blackboard, without the need for modifications. This means that a course made in SCORM can be easily used by different schools, universities, or companies, saving time and money.
SCORM also ensures that student progress, such as test scores or completed parts of the course, is tracked correctly. So, if you start a course on an office computer and then continue on a tablet at home, the system will remember where you left off.
Leaderboards
Leaderboards are a gamification tool used to display and compare user performance in various contexts, such as training courses, work activities, or internal competitions.
A “leaderboard” provides a ranking of the scores and results of the various participants, creating a competitive and motivating environment. Using a leaderboard to gamify an activity can significantly increase user engagement.
This tool can be customized to reflect the success criteria best suited to each company, such as the time taken to complete activities, the number of tasks completed, or the number of satisfied customers. This makes leaderboards a flexible and versatile tool that can be adapted to various business purposes and objectives, promoting a culture of continuous improvement and collaboration.
A leaderboard is one of the best-known mechanisms for stimulating users’ “intrinsic motivation,” which is often one of the main shortcomings of training courses, as we explained in the previous section of this article.
How to Measure the Impact of Gamification in Corporate Training?
Measuring the return on investment, or “ROI,” of gamification interventions allows you to compare the costs of implementing such interventions and the benefits resulting from greater user engagement, better learning outcomes, and behavioral changes.
A positive ROI would indicate that including these elements in e-learning courses was a successful and worthwhile investment.
What should you measure to assess the impact of Gamification? Some specific ROI indicators for gamification are:
- Engagement with educational content
Engagement measures how actively users interact with the material, indicating their level of interest and motivation.
It can be quantified by monitoring the number of accesses, the time spent on each content, interaction with the various components of the material, and much more. In this sense, xAPI is useful, the standard method for tracking learning data, as we discussed in the previous section.
- Learning time
Learning time measures the amount of time needed to complete training modules. Reducing the time needed for learning without compromising the quality of the lessons is a sign of successful gamification, as it means participants are acquiring knowledge more efficiently.
The reduction in learning time can be verified by analyzing the data collected on each user by the LMS platform, considering the number of hours studied, time to complete quizzes and the entire training path, as well as the relationship of these factors to the results.
- Direct user feedback
Feedback is a direct way to understand whether the content is perceived as useful and effective. For example, users may be asked to rate each completed learning unit with a score from 1 to 5, or to give an overall evaluation at the end of the training path.
Furthermore, by monitoring data on the use of interactive educational content, you can understand the effectiveness of the material and possible improvements to increase its training potential. Assigning points and badges as recognition of results is also a form of monitoring, as well as one of the most used gamification techniques.
Some Examples of Gamification in Corporate Training
Now that we have provided you with all the elements to understand how gamification works and how to implement it in the context of corporate training, let’s look at some examples of application in real companies.
A very well-known example is Kahoot!, a platform that allows you to create interactive quizzes and multiple-choice games.
In the corporate environment, Kahoot! can be used during training sessions to make learning more engaging and interactive. Employees participate in quizzes in real time, competing with each other to get the highest scores. This not only encourages active participation but also creates a fun and dynamic learning environment. In addition, quiz results can be used to identify areas for improvement and further personalize training paths.
Conclusion
Gamification represents one of the most promising evolutions in the field of digital learning for corporate training, capable of transforming the learning experience into something more engaging and motivating.
At WhoTeach, we believe that gamification is one of the keys to making e-learning even more efficient.
Thanks to our experience and innovative approach, we are able to create tailor-made training paths for companies, schools, and institutions, helping you achieve your learning goals effectively and engagingly.
To find out more or book a consultation with one of our experts, you can contact us at info@whoteach.it or by clicking here!
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