Secrets to Successfully Using Serious Games in Online Training

#1: Focus on the goal

A serious game’s success depends on its focus on the learning goal. Keep it short to steer clear of any kind of cognitive overload on the learners. Corporate learners have specific learning requirements. They are either seeking relevant information or trying to enhance a skill. Excess information leads them away from these core objectives and renders the serious games ineffective. If you do not want to lose your learners midway, make sure that you take out excess content.

#2: Make it essential

Your employees have several essential tasks to perform throughout their work day. Most times they have to prioritize work before training. Even the best-gamified learning scenarios may not be strong enough to draw every employee to participate with the same amount of enthusiasm. Making it an essential part of the corporate culture and annual employee objectives works better in making the serious game implementation a success. Cisco, for example, has not only been able to enhance its employee productivity, but also won a Gold Brandon Hall Excellence in Technology award for using serious games in its sales training programs.

#3: Build in competition

Humans are competitive. They always try and perform better when compared with others. This is true for your employees, too. Serious games use leaderboards to encourage peers to compete with each other. Every time the learners compete, they get better at the relevant skill.

#4: Reward good performance

Serious games can be fun, but it is still training. And, training is an integral part of work. There has to be some form of rewards and recognitions attached to work. Rewards may not mean cash or perks, only. There are other ways to show appreciation. Give your employees a day off, or picnic baskets of gourmet food items, a letter of appreciation from senior leadership, or even a small trophy that they can display on their desk. It does not matter how they are being rewarded. The idea is to recognize good performance at each step, in order to make a serious game worth their time and effort.

#5: Collect relevant data

Serious games are a rich repository of learner data. This data goes a long way to help improve processes that have a real impact on the results. If your learners do not improve even after taking the training, you may want to take a second look at your design strategy. The data collected will help you fine tune the areas that need improvement.

At Designing Digitally, Inc., our experts believe in customizing training based on the problem you are facing. We build serious games that produce real impact.

Get in touch with our experts to learn more about how serious games can benefit your learning and development needs.