Gamification: What is it and Why You Need it
The backbone to any organization’s success or failure is its workforce. Healthy and engaged workers are more emotionally invested in the company, produce higher quality work, and can help to form competitive yet cohesive office cultures. With over 60% of companies in the US now offering corporate wellness programs, it’s easy to think employees would be apt to utilizing the health promoting resources now available to them. However, according to a Gallup survey, only 32% of US employees are actively engaged in their work. This begs the question, if more than two-thirds of employees aren’t already focused on the job responsibilities in which they’re paid for, how realistic is it to expect them participate in the wellness programs offered by their companies?
What is Gamification?
Gamification is the process of taking something that already exist, like a website or online program, and integrating game mechanics into it to encourage participation.
The average American spends over 11 hours a day using electronic media. The advent of Gamification takes clear advantage of where the attention of the common person already flows, right in front of a PC or mobile device.
How does it work?
Hypothetically, let’s say a company of 1,000 employees signs a contract with a wellness organization. The thousand-employee company’s primary goal is to initiate a company wide program to help motivate its employees to implement healthier nutritional choices. The wellness organization’s goal is to implement the aforementioned program, create an environment that educates the workers on the pros and cons of the variety of foods, and promote the most effective strategy to receive the maximum amount of buy-in and participation from the staff.
The Employee Benefit Research Institute shows that 43% of employees who don’t participate in their company’s wellness program doesn’t do so because they “felt the program was not conveniently located.”
When gamification is done right, it provides an easily trackable, convenient, and straightforward model that employees are able to take an active ongoing role in.
Why does it work?
Accountability and competition is the name of the game when it comes to achieving a goal of any sort. When a person owns and feels responsible for their objective, the likelihood of them achieving whatever goal they’ve set for themselves is exponentially greater. Whether that push is on an intrinsic level, or through the external aim of outside competition, gamification is a tool that can work as a liaison between bridging both of these polarities together.
Where to start
Firstly, understanding the landscape of corporate wellness and all of its untapped resources would be the most ideal place to begin. Here in the current 21st century environment, we are at an ever-important time in the global health of the population as a whole. With diseases, fatigue-ridden workers, and deterioration of health still on a steady incline, there’s never been a time more pertinent than now to step into the impactful arena of corporate wellness.
If you’ve ever thought of expanding your wellness clientele in the corporate arena and feel like it could be beneficial to your business, please check out our next Corporate Wellness Academy webinar, it could be exactly what you need at this time.
