Game Changer | Employee Gamification | Internal Enterprise Gamification | hosted by Jesse Lahey, Aspendale Communications

We are in the early years of a fundamental demographic shift. The Millennial generation — which is even larger than the massive Baby Boom generation — now makes up a third of the workforce. As younger millennials continue to graduate from college, their powerful mix of values, communication style, and work perspective is driving a work-culture revolution. As you lead a team that’s increasingly made up of millennials, understanding their motivators is essential to your success. This is a challenge that Aaren Terrett knows very well, since his organization is made up almost entirely of millennials. Aaren is director of sales operations at O2E Brands, the parent company of 1-800-GOT-JUNK?, Wow 1 Day Painting, You Move Me, and Shack Shine. What’s the secret to his company’s success in producing consistent and sustained motivation in its millennial workforce? “We apply the principles of frequent feedback, recognition of success, and instant communication,” Aaren says. “Some people call it gamification. We call it leadership of our people. It’s the way the millennial workforce likes to be led.” Jesse and Aaren discuss the profile of the millennial at work, and how O2E has used gamification principles to shape a positive culture, improve customer service, and increase productivity. Their discussion includes: Contests, prizes, and instant and visually engaging public recognition, New-hire training that includes interactive video game structures, and Gamification principles incorporated into their recruiting and career advancement processes. Aaren Terrett is the director of sales operations at O2E Brands, headquartered in Vancouver, BC. O2E, which stands for “ordinary to exceptional,” operates four franchise brands with a combined revenue of $150M. Resources Mentioned in This Episode Website: o2ebrands.com LinkedIn: O2E Brands Twitter: @1800gotjunk Facebook: /1-800-GOT-JUNK? Article: Gamifying Your Workforce: How to Make Engagement Fun Article: Peer to peer: What should my business do to effectively engage with millennials? Visual examples Subscription Links iTunes Stitcher RSS Your Feedback If you like our show, please rate us on iTunes. That makes a huge difference in helping more people discover it. We love to know your thoughts about this episode. Please submit your comments below! You can also email comments to Jesse at [email protected], subscribe to him on Facebook, or follow him on <a href="http://www.twitter.

For several years, recruiting has been one of the business processes that has best leveraged the potential of gamification. According to a recent article in HR Magazine, gamification can be an effective strategy for talent acquisition because of the power to: Trigger interest in job openings, Enable (and reward) current employees to easily share job openings with their external network and get feedback on their contacts’ progress during the recruiting process, Project an innovative image of the employer, Give candidates a realistic preview of the job, and Predict applicants’ future job performance. Resources Mentioned in This Episode Previously discussed on GameChanger: Zao Bunchball Badgeville Additional gamification resources profiled by HR Magazine:  Captain Up Games for Business HackerRank mLevel Pymetrics  To stay up on the latest news and trends in employee gamification, join the Game Changer group on LinkedIn. Subscription Links iTunes Stitcher RSS Your Feedback If you like our show, please rate us on iTunes. That makes a huge difference in helping more people discover it. We love to know your thoughts about this episode. Please submit your comments below! You can also email comments to Jesse at [email protected], subscribe to him on Facebook, or follow him on Twitter.

Gamification concepts continue to be integrated as part of normal business practices; sometimes it’s as subtle as taking inspiration from certain game elements when tweaking a business process, and at the other end of the spectrum, sometimes it’s literally creating a game for people to play. For one growing company, they not only have created a game that tens of thousands of people have played, they are changing the overall “game” of business itself — to transform corporate culture, education, and entrepreneurship. As long-time listeners of Jesse’s podcasts know, he’s passionate about the power of business and communication to make a positive difference in communities and in individual lives. FreshBiz Global is a “For-Benefit” training company with a mission to infuse fun, multidimensional winning, and smart thinking into organizations around the world. They accomplish this through workshops based on their award-winning FreshBiz board game (also soon to be released in digital format), the book The New Entrepreneurz, and the plug-and-play FreshBiz Training Kit for trainers and managers to take teams through transformational learning experiences. The FreshBiz game creates a business simulation where players create “Smartnerships,” play Action Cards, learn to leverage their strengths, and use other principles that help them embody a “For-Benefit” approach to business, where success is when everyone wins. The intention is that playing the game helps people rewire their brain to a mindset that is more collaborative, open, creative, and daring, so they not only sharpen their entrepreneurial skills but also experience an approach to business that maximizes benefit for everyone playing rather than just maximizing profit at all cost. Currently, over 35,000 people across 20 countries — from business students and entrepreneurs to executives and teams — have gone through the FreshBiz experience and are now smarter in business and life. Simcha Gluck is the chief trainer and co-founder of FreshBiz Global. He is also co-author of the book The New Entrepreneurz: Changing the Way You Play Life, and he hosts the radio talk show Innovation Nation on Voice of Israel. Resources Mentioned in This Episode Website:  http://www.freshbizgame.com/ Twitter:  @FreshBizGame GameChangers500: www.freshbiz.gamechangers500.com Book: The New Entrepreneurz: Changing the Way You Play Life Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/simchagluck Facebook: www.facebook.com/FreshBiz/ To stay up on the latest news and trends in employee gamification, join the Game Changer group on LinkedIn. Subscription Links iTunes Stitcher RSS Your Feedback If you like our show, please rate us on iTunes.

Social media has a powerful effect on company sales and recruiting efforts. But just having a corporate communications person post things on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter doesn’t actually bring results. On social media, people pay attention to people, not to companies. Employees and partners collectively have an audience 10x larger than the company itself. ~ Technorati Advocacy Study Brand messages are re-shared 24x more frequently when distributed by employees vs. companies. ~ MSLGroup Content shared by an employee generates 8x more engagement than content shared by a company. ~ SocialMediaToday Report 2014 Today we’ll discuss the challenges that have prevented most companies from effectively engaging their employees as ambassadors on social sharing sites. And we’ll discuss one option that seems to be working for Starbucks, Molson Coors, and other companies. Ivan Tsarynny is the co-founder and CEO of PostBeyond, a gamified platform that helps employees of large companies more effectively engage as ambassadors on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Launched in April 2013, PostBeyond provides a Pinterest-style library that curates online articles and images that are relevant to company interests. Content is first suggested for the library by employees as well as an automated aggregation engine. If it gets the thumbs-up from corporate, the content is filtered into the library, where employees can share the posts without worrying about crossing liability lines. Resources Mentioned in This Episode * Website:  postbeyond.com * White paper: Employee Advocacy: Where Trust Builds Bottom Line * Guide: Employee Social Media Policy Guidelines * Twitter: @Ivan_Tsarynny and @postbeyond To stay up on the latest news and trends in employee gamification, join the Game Changer group on LinkedIn. Subscription Links iTunes Stitcher RSS Your Feedback If you like our show, please rate us on iTunes. That makes a huge difference in helping more people discover it. We love to know your thoughts about this episode. Please submit your comments below! You can also email comments to Jesse at [email protected], subscribe to him on Facebook, or follow him on Twitter.