The gamification market size in 2020 had a global value of $9.1 billion and is predicted to register an impressive growth rate of 27.4%, reaching $30.7 billion by 2025 (MarketsandMarkets, 2020).

Contests and incentives push people to become more creative and productive at work.

 Gamification doesn’t always have to be a fancy online tool. You can easily create contests and incentives for staff. For example, a framing business owner noticed that his best framer was doing two or three times what the other framers were doing. So, he took the number that the top framer was doing and he challenged the rest of the framers to beat his performance. He told them that anybody who hits that number in a day with no damage to any of the products gets a bonus for that day.

 The benchmarked performance of the top performer at their level drives employees to compete intrinsically with themselves by setting goals for themselves.

 Exercise:

1. What are your top sales person’s sales results right now?
2. How much better would your revenue be if you brought others to that level?
3. What are your KPIs?
4. Have you made your BHAG’s? (big hairy audacious goals)
5. Do you currently have a contest or regular measurement to have everyone hit that KPI goal? If so how effective is it currently?

If you don’t, brainstorm a contest right now that’s more than what they’re achieving with a prize for everyone else that hits this goal. This is your opportunity to start moving from where you are to where you want to be.

The urge to do well is what really drives performance. 

High productivity can be a sign of a healthy competitive workplace, as employees try to show they can undo each other’s work more efficiently. The achievement of other employees becomes yardsticks that serve as reference points for other employees to continually improve themselves. 

People respect what you inspect, this is how you show them what you expect. 

What happens to the employee/team who loses the contest?

Contests within a workplace can have disadvantages as well. Hence, it is important to organize and structure them carefully and strategically. Each contest should have clear goals and serve as a targeted goal to improve your employees’ productivity and your business in general.

 It is vital to create a no-fear culture as you employ this strategy at work. While it is a proven effective way to motivate employees, competition may cause additional stress, anxiety, and poor team morale.  

 Use it to engage and challenge employees, but do not forget to give the lower performing team members a chance to redeem themselves and make up for the loss by encouraging them and making them feel that you believe in them.

 As a conclusion

 If you’re not measuring effectiveness, your organization’s productivity could be lower than it should be and your goals might be further away than they need to be or closer than you realize. So, identify your KPI’s, create performance benchmarks, institute contests, and put the numbers up. Then see what happens in your company or department.

ACTION

If you’d like some help with identifying the numbers you should be focused on, and diagnosing the effectiveness of your company, you can learn more about our Opportunity Assessment.