Gamification for Talent Development and Retention

Friday, November 15, 2013

 

We saw how gamification might play a role in the staffing of a new customer service center.  Now let’s look at the role that gamification could play in raising the skill level of talent and building employee affiliation with the organization.

 

Our new customer service center is up and has been operating for six months, but the analytics are pointing to some troubling trends.  First call resolution is below standard, mis-re-directed calls are too high, escalated call cases to Level 2 and 3 are too high, and staff turn-over is increasing.  Root cause analysis has identified several inter-related issues.  After reviewing various options, management has elected to re-design the gamification platform and re-introduce it to the call center staff.

 

All call center staff members are encouraged to explore the re-designed gamification platform.  Staff who participant and reach top level game performance will be recognized with an achievement “badge” as a mentor.  As part of their recognition, mentors will also be provided with development in coaching the work of other employees.  Staff members who are struggling with a specific issue, e.g., first call resolution are encouraged to voluntarily seek out a mentor for one-on-one coaching.  In addition, mentors will be asked to seek out and engage with employees who may be at risk of turnover.

 

Management is confident this approach will lead to significant improvements in the center’s analytics, nevertheless, they are expecting to see a change in the trend into more positive territory and they have allowed us 90 days to change the trend direction.  In addition to tools for recognizing mentors, staff members who improve their individual and team performance are eligible for spot bonuses, time-off with pay, and travel and entertainment gifts, and the opportunity to become mentors themselves.

 

While management wants to see improvement in individual performance, they recognize that call center functionality is highly correlated to the overall inter-workings of the “team”.  Management does NOT want to engender an “us vs. them” or a “have vs. have not” environment.  Consequently, in the re-design of the gamification platform now includes an internal “crowd-sourcing” component which was added to encourage and allow both real and spontaneous “teams” of Customer Relations Representatives to achieve recognition by solutions to performance issues.

 

While not a panacea, gamification holds the prospect of becoming another viable tool to address talent motivational and retention concerns.  Gamification may have a special and unique connection to both Generation “X” and “Y” employees.  Generation “X”, the lost generation, may be skeptical of gamification, nevertheless, they entered the labor force as personal computing took over the workplace.  On the other hand, generation “Y”, the millennium generation, has grown up with ubiquitous technology. 

 

Last but not least are Baby Boomers, an estimated 79 million Baby Boomers are in the work force and many plan to continue working well past their normal retirement age.  Baby Boomers are not “technology” novices, however, they are idealistic, competitive, loyal, and tend to question authority.  So, gamification design must address these characteristics if it is to be effective with this cohort.

Gamification in the Selection Process

Friday, November 08, 2013

 

Gamification is the process of applying of game-like techniques to address organizational issues including employee screening and selection.  Consider that you must source, recruit, select, onboard, train, and assign 50 new customer service representatives (CSR) for a new service center within 30 days.  Traditional methods could take much more than 30 days just to source, recruit, select, and onboard 50 employees.  Now they have to be trained, requiring 40 classroom hours to reach mastery.  Past experience has show that 20% of new hires fail to achieve mastery and must be released, requiring that you over staff to compensate for the potential turnover.

 

Our gamification approach is to create a game-like scenario and invite our pool of applicants to “play” the game as part of the selection process.  The applicant creates a profile giving themselves a user name, password, and an alter ego avatar and enters the game at the lowest level.  The applicant’s avatar is presented with the basic duties of the CSR’s role as well as a tool kit with a limited number of solutions to entry level tasks.

 

Next the CSR is faced with entry level challenges and simulations from the game’s “wizard”, i.e., logging on to the system, recording time and tasks, logging an inbound call,  re-directing calls, assigning calls to a higher level CSR, … etc.  Our avatar is permitted to reach into their toolkit for solutions to these entry-level tasks.  Each solution contains basic information on the task, response(s) to the task, and a simulated exercise.  Successful completion of the simulation and challenge allows our avatar to attempt the next challenge.

 

The game’s wizard rewards each successful challenge encounter with “game bucks” and offers coaching on any unsuccessful encounter.  Our avatar may attempt any challenge an unlimited number of times, but cannot advance to the next game level until they have successfully completed each challenge at the current level.  As our avatar advances to the next level, they are awarded a “badge” recognizing their current level of achievement and a few game bucks.  Game bucks are used to buy a solution toolkit for each succeeding level and can be used to buy additional solutions for the current level if our avatar runs out of toolkit solutions.

 

The game’s design may include numerous task levels from entry to supervisory.  As our avatar progresses to each succeeding level in the game, the challenges become more difficult and the simulations become more complex and lengthy.  Our avatar may choose to stop and end the game at any level.  Based on the applicant’s past experience and skill level, they may successfully complete one or all levels.  Information collected during the applicant’s play provides the selection decision maker(s) with an insight into the applicant’s possible performance.  Such information is intended to “assist” with a robust selection and assignment process and is NOT intended to supplant practices such as personal interviews, background, and reference checks.

To Train or Not To Train

Friday, November 01, 2013

 

This must be another age-old question every organization has faced.  Does an organization train its employees and face the possibility those employees will leave or does an organization NOT train its employees and face the possibility those employees will leave?  Either way, the organization could be faced with the loss of talent.  Yes, it is possible that whether you train or not, employees might choose to exit the organization and that is the chance every employer takes.  While there are no guarantees in life or for that matter, business; the bonds between the organization and its top talent must be based on more than a paycheck or the availability of training.  “… rewards create a stronger emotional bond between employees and the company.”

 

Training is an investment.  Like any investment, the investor expects, demands a return.  As with any investment, there is a risk the expected rate of return will or will not materialize.  If the only bond between the employee and their organization is a paycheck, the likelihood of the employee’s continued retention is small.  The employee has to “desire” to remain with the organization.  The value of that “desire” is complex and multidimensional.  Cash compensation is certainly part of the equitation, but so are employee benefits, as is non-cash recognition, the organization’s brand, peer relationships, managers, organizational leaders and their agenda.

 

Training is a multiplier.  Just as capital investment in new equipment, systems or an organizational acquisition can leverage an employer’s ability to compete, so can training.  While training on a new Customer Relationship Management system (CRM) is required for all Customer Service Representatives, leadership development should be reserved for the organization’s top performers.  Although training should never be couched in terms of punishment; training is a development tool for all levels of performance.

 

Training transfers core organizational values.  The transfer of core organizational values is essential to the sustainability of every culture, including a corporate culture.  Common core values, between the employer and employee, help to bond an employee to that organization.  As with any relationship, core values must be communicated, training provides one means of effecting that communication.  To be effective at engaging employees, training must incorporate core organizational values in all phases of its design and implementation.

 

Training is global.  It should come as no surprise to anyone that training is a global issue in retaining top talent.  While it is an over simplification, the desire for training and top talent are mutual values competitive organizations want in their global workforce.  As such training provides a means to engage a workforce that is often disconnected and out of touch with an organization’s mission.  Training is the glue that bonds together the various components which make-up a multinational employer.

 

Training is a motivator.  Training can be designed in a manner that will excite, instill focus, and direction in otherwise unguided employees.

Cash Bonus Programs, How Effective Are They?

Friday, October 25, 2013

 

Cash Bonus Programs are a mainstay of many organization’s Total Rewards, but how effective are they is driving the desired performance behavior and linking that performance to organizational initiatives?  The answer can be found in their design, communication, execution, maintenance, and measurement.

 

Design:  “If I offer a large bonus, won’t my workers will do an outstanding job.”  Not necessarily.  Who is eligible, what performance outcomes are desired, what performance behavior is eligible, how is the calculation done, when are payment made, is the bonus integrated with base pay, is a portion of the bonus “held back” or deferred, are bonus payments included in calculations for benefits, are pay-outs scalable and variable based on performance levels required and organizational needs?

 

Communication:  I once worked for an organization where eligibility for bonus programs was not communicated to the covered employees.  How much, how often, when, and to whom bonus program edibility is communicated is essential to driving the desired performance behaviors and linking those behaviors to organizational initiatives.  Communications drives the “brand” identity of a bonus program, its perceived organization support, as well as its creditability.

 

Execution:  It is never sufficient to design and communicate a rewards program if its execution falls short of delivering on the payouts effectively and efficiently.  The power of a rewards system loses its ability to drive the desired performance behaviors if payouts are incorrect, delayed, lack creditability or presented in an inappropriate manner.  While an organization may not want to publish dollar amounts on their corporate web site, top reward earners should be celebrated nevertheless in some internal/external fashion, e.g., “The Million Dollar Club, Top Sales of the Year, Zero Lost Time Accidents for 10 Years”, … etc.

 

Maintenance:  Organizations live in a dynamic and complex ecosystem of competitors, regulations, and technology.  To be successful, every rewards system must be adaptable to the changing internal and external environment in order to tie performance behavior to the ever changing and new organizational initiatives.  A bonus plan from 2000 is unlikely to drive performance behavior or be linked to the organizational initiatives of today.  Left unattended, any bonus program will become out-of-date and un-harmonized and may even drive the organization to be less competitive, create recruitment and retention issues, and raise sustainability questions with stakeholders.

 

Measurement:  It is a commonly held belief that failing to measure is tantamount to failing to manage.  Ongoing outcome measurement of any bonus program is the foundation for the determination of its effectiveness in changing behavior, i.e., increased profitable sales, reduced costs, … etc.  Without a base-line measurement, it becomes impossible to know if the incentives of a bonus program are too high, too low or just right.  While financial measurement is generally the realm of an organization’s finance function, it is vital that a program’s owners (HR, Marketing, Sales, and Production) be in alignment with its Return on Investment.

 

Workplace Bullying and Top Talent

Friday, September 27, 2013

 

According to The Healthy Workplace Campaign, workplace bullying takes the general forms of:

 

•Verbal abuse.

•Offensive behaviors that are threatening, humiliating or intimidating.

•Work interference or sabotage that prevents work from getting done.

 

Writing for the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), Roy Maurer reports that since 2003, two dozen states have established legislation which provide protection for bullied workers and allows them to sue without the need to first demonstrate discrimination.

 

The basis for workplace bulling behavior is complex and employers are generally not equipped to address or correct it.  However, failure to address situations of workplace bullying can have both a direct and an indirect impact on an organization’s efficiency and productivity.  This impact can include increased turnover, lowered levels of service, missed deadlines, and potential litigation against the employer for “allowing” a hostile workplace to persist.

 

An article in the Harvard Business Review for January-February 2013, “The Price of Incivility”, authored jointly by Christine Porath and Christine Pearson paint bulling as an infectious disease.  The authors conclude: “Incivility [bullying] is expensive, and few organizations recognize or take action to curtail it.”

 

Gary Belsky, writing for Time’s Business and Money, reported on a Canadian study in which it was found that “witnesses” to bulling may be as impacted as the intended target of the bullying event.  So visualize this, some of the organization’s top new talent are in a conference when Employee X berates the comments and questions of a co-worker.  What impact is there on the employer’s new top talent?  One, they will adopt that same behavior or two they will start looking for their next job.  Either way, it can be assumed that the unit’s productivity will suffer if such behavior is allowed to continue.

 

An employer’s “brand” is an essential part of the organization’s talent recruitment and retention toolbox.  Street rumors, even if unfounded, concerning an environment which tolerates bullying, can dull the sharpness of the ability of an organization to attract and retain the best talent.  As most organizations have sought to diversify their talent base, they have adopted policies which do not tolerate inappropriate verbal and non-verbal behavior towards women, minorities, and other protected groups.  Jackson Lewis, a US based law firm, dedicated to representing management exclusively in workplace law matters, recommends the adoption of workplace bullying policies.

 

In its efforts to source, recruit, and retain top talent, an anti-bullying policy sends a strong message to current and future employees that the organization will not accept such behavior.  In the same manner that employers have worked to foster a conducive work environment for women, minorities, and others, businesses desiring to attract and retain top talent need to consider the chilling impact that bulling has not only on their top talent, but on their customers and clients.

How to Lose Great Employees in 10 Easy Steps

Friday, September 20, 2013

 ● Ignore them – disregard their advice and suggestions.

Great employees don’t expect to have their advice and suggestions noticed or taken seriously.

● Hide them – bury them somewhere so no one knows they exist.

Visibility to organizational executive management and customers is overrated.

● Don’t challenge them – great employees do not want to be tested.

Great employees don’t want any additional responsibilities; they already have enough on their plate.

● Forget recognition – they are happy being the unsung heroes.

There is no need to recognize great employees, anyway they shun the limelight.

 ● Rewards aren’t required – great employees are rewarded by their jobs.

Just working for the organization and their managers is enough of a reward.

● Don’t promote them – they are too valuable where they are.

The organization cannot afford for great employees to move into other roles.

● Exclude from projects – great employees are not motivated by project work.

Great employees would not enjoy the prospects of a special assignment.

● Isolate them – they work best off-line, excluded from other employees.

Working with others on a team is something from which great employees shy.

● Don’t provide training – great employees do not need training.

Great employees are already fully trained and if they are not, anyway, they are insulted by training.

● Exclude from interviewing – they have no insights into a candidate’s potential.

Great employees are uncomfortable interviewing job candidates.

Great employees start with great hires.  Short changing the sourcing, recruiting, and selection process is akin to including out-of-date ingredients in a cake.  Great employers are absolute in their desire to hire the best employees – and to keep the best of the best.

Interviewing, A Talent Acquisition or A Talent Management Tool?

Friday, September 13, 2013

 

Most organizations would agree that interviewing job applicants is important to the overall success of the business operations of their company.  Likewise, most managers and supervisors would argue interviewing is an essential component of their leadership roles within the organization.  Where disagreement is most likely to occur is in the discussion of the best interviewing method used to select the top job candidate.

 

While not part of the actual interview technique, interviewer preparation, avoiding illegal questions, and the interview environment are important aspects of the overall candidate selection process.  Lack of interviewer preparedness sends a strong negative message to the candidate about both the interviewer and organization.  Even today, there are examples of organizations straying into areas of questioning which should be avoided, and suffering the outcomes.  It is amazing to see some of the locations in which job interviews are held.

 

The purpose of the interview is oblivious; identify the top candidate so the organization can extend an offer, fill a vacancy, and move on to serving its internal and/or external customers.  But how does a hiring manager distill down to that top candidate?  After all, candidates are not homogeneous single dimensional entities.  The highest level of technical skills will not overcome a shortfall of interpersonal communications skills in a role requiring constant interaction, cooperation, and collaboration with others.

 

Candidate interviewing techniques are as varied as the organizations utilizing them, however, they can be classified in two general categories: non-behavioral and behavioral.

 

Non-behavioral interviewing techniques are often lists of yes and no or short answer questions which can be visualized as a check-off list.  Answering “Yes”, to “Do you know how to use Excel?” provides the interviewer with no depth as to knowledge or skill level the candidate has in “using” the tool.  “Yes”, does not tell us anything about the degree of sophistication of the candidate’s experience or the environment in which Excel was used.

 

Behavioral interviewing techniques attempt to dig deep down into the candidate’s past experience.  It gets at the what, when, where, why, and how of how they performed their work and under what conditions.  By restating the Excel question to, “Tell me about the most difficult assignment you ever had using Excel?”, the interviewer can expand into add-on questions.  One possible add-on question might include: “What made this assignment so difficult?”.  From this line of questioning, the interviewer might learn about conflicts with other work assignments, availability of other team resources, time constraints, and whether or not the assignment was successfully completed.

 

No interviewing technique is perfect.  Candidates have been known to “pull one over” on a single interviewer.  When behavioral interviewing is used with multiple interviewers, each focused on a different aspect of the position, it becomes less likely that a bottom rung applicant will be mistake for a top candidate.  Interviewing is both time consuming and expensive.  However, selecting the wrong candidate may prove to be even more time consuming and more expensive.