Gamification isn’t a buzzword anymore. Its valuation, which was $4.91 billion in 2016, skyrocketed to $9.1 billion in just four years and is only increasing.
Where every industry is adopting gamification to boost its operations, it’s time for the recruitment industry too to get its game on.
Let’s see how it can prove to be more than just a trend and benefit competitive industries, such as recruitment.
What is Gamification?
Gamification introduces some positive aspects of gameplay to the work environment to make it more exciting and engaging.
Gamification aims to target user behavior and motivate them through gaming characteristics.
Since 2010, the gamification market has seen rapid growth. It’s mainly because of
1) Increase in the number of mobile users
2) Easy accessibility to internet services
3) Growth of social media
What are the Benefits of Introducing Gamification to the Recruitment Strategy?
1) Cut Down the Manual Efforts
Instead of going through every profile to shortlist top candidates, introduce gamified tests to filter out chaff from the wheat.
It will save you a lot of time and make the hiring process much more manageable.
And a shorter interview cycle automatically increases your chances of filling a position faster.
2) Keep it Fun & Simple
Gamification for the recruitment process isn’t just for attracting candidates but also makes analyzing the results less boring for companies.
Candidates engaging better with a hiring process leads to a more successful application rate.
3) Make it Interactive
There are thousands of companies looking for an ideal candidate. That’s why it’s critical to distinguish yourself from the crowd.
An interactive hiring approach improves brand image and awareness so that more potential applicants prefer your company over others.
4) Do Away With Stress
If the number of candidates applying to the position isn’t as per your expectation, then check out your application process.
If it looks more like a bank form with endless questions, throw it away right now.
Filling out lengthy application records stresses out candidates affecting their performance as well.
Applications of Gamification in the Hiring Cycle
1) Test the Right Skills
Skill-based hiring is the name of the game.
Your assessment process is the most critical aspect of the hiring journey that filters the noise. And, if your focus is to bring onboard top talent, then a standard questionnaire or personality tests won’t help.
You can introduce puzzles, riddles, and interactive use cases to make the assessment tests less intimidating. Since everyone likes games, it will excite candidates to participate actively.
Where personality tests might throw you off because of inaccurate analysis or biases, gamified series objectifies the whole assessment.
Example- The hotel chain ‘My Marriott’ ran a recruitment process where candidates were asked to enter a virtual room to handle real-life hospitality challenges.
However, ensure that your tests are a perfect balance of fun and business. A caricature-ish assessment test can turn out to be a gimmick rather than serving an actual purpose.
2) Speed Up Onboarding & Training
Proper orientation is the foundation of a better candidate experience that may decide how long your employee will stay with you.
A gamified training setup maintains candidate engagement while sharing the necessary information. This boosts knowledge retention and makes the transition smoother.
You can incorporate progress charts to encourage candidates to finish the series faster. Even quizzes are a great tool to reinforce the essential aspects of the training and assess how much the candidate has grasped.
Once the candidates understand the company’s values, goals, and job roles, it will translate into more productivity and growth.
3) Focus on Upskilling
The market is full of opportunities up for grabs.
Amidst the cutthroat competition, how are you planning to retain your top talent?
A whopping 70% of the employees are ready to leave for a company providing better training and skill development opportunities. So, let’s start with that.
To keep the employees excited about coming to the office every day, introduce meaningful challenges to their monotonous routines. One of the best ways to do so is by investing in upskilling your employees.
It’s a win-win situation for both parties since the employees will boost their expertise while contributing more efficiently to the organization.
You can implement a learning & development portal where employees can learn about new subjects and get better at what they are doing.
A reward system is an excellent initiative for incentivizing efforts and progress. You can motivate employees by offering badges, points, or coupons for suitable achievements. Even creating leaderboards will induce healthy competition among peers to do better.
How to Add Gamification to Your Recruitment Setup?
1) Don’t Rush the Implementation
Haphazard introduction of gamification into your existing setup can be a big turn-off for serious candidates.
Instead of jumping the gun, plan well and thoughtfully.
1) Identify the processes where you want to introduce gamification.
2) Figure out which type of game would make sense for a process.
3) See how and on which parameters you will measure the game’s results.
2) Research & Get Inspired
If it’s a new endeavor for you, get out there and explore. It will reduce doubts and make the implementation smoother.
1) Research what other market players are doing. You can refer to their games, interface, and effectiveness.
2) Talk to candidates and gather their opinion on the whole gamification wave.
3) Don’t limit yourself to just the recruitment sector. Interact with other industries too, for inspiration.
3)Figure Out the Technology to Use
Now that you know what you want, let’s figure out how you will get that.
1) Choose the technology stack which you want to use for gamification.
2) Set up a dedicated team to work on this project.
3) Create a beta version and test it among the study group for feedback.
4) Incorporate the feedback for an easy-to-use process.
4) Promote & Engage
Once your recruitment process 2.0 is ready, get on with the promotion to engage the audience.
1) Use social media to promote your hiring process.
2) Add the details with screenshots for visual appeal.
3) Create a mascot to guide the candidate in the application journey and build a personal connection with candidates.
What’s the Future of Gamification?
Where everyone can hire, but making employees join and stay is a different ballgame. It requires consistent effort and engagement.
And understandably, not every recruiter might have time to invest personally in each candidate’s hiring journey, so it makes sense to let automation do that.
If you want to get on the gamification train at the earliest, then outsource the grind. Go with a vendor who can accelerate the development process for you.
Choose the one that
1) Have prior experience with games and data management.
2) Can design easy-to-use games for the target audience.
3) Develop games that are fun yet serve the purpose.
4) Fall within your budget.
Gamifying the recruitment process is a creative alternative to the old application process that can bring a diverse team to your organization.
