Occasionally we’ll tweet excerpts from our book, Total Engagement, and then give more context here on our blog:
Twitter Tidbit #24:
Games give us a new lens through which we can examine cherished ideas about management and new tools—some simple and some radical—with which to experiment. Pg 13
Tweet in Context:
Most important, this book should enable you to evaluate the arguments for a new idea that has been discussed in academia and industry labs but that is only now poised to guide innovations and practices in the workplace. We think the timing is right. A global economic downturn creates enormous stress on management and workers, and opens the door to disruptive innovation of all kinds. Games give us a new lens through which we can examine cherished ideas about management and new tools—some simple and some radical—with which to experiment. We are just starting to see applications that execute this vision and will tell you about the best examples we have been able to find. We wish we had even more; maybe they will come from you and your colleagues. It’s even possible that the early misapplication of these powerful techniques in the workplace could delay broader use until people are comfortable with checks and safeguards. To supplement stories from real companies, we’ll describe some examples that we think will advance the field, and each chapter will begin with a story like Jennifer’s that has either already happened or could happen in the very near future.
The full first chapter can be found here.
Interesting angle on addressing the issue of prioritization. As we all know, it’s too easy to overwhelm ourselves with “task” overload.
Why not take your concept and extend it too other settings as well – for example, entrepreneurs and even in personal life. The real scarcity in life is not money … but time.
I am currently reading your book for a Virtual Reality course which is part of my masters work. It has been very interesting so far and I have one general question that I thought I could pose to the authors.
Throughout the book you raise the point that businesses need to pay people to work but those same people will go home and pay to play a video game. This is used as an argument to support the need for companies to make work more like the games their employees pay to play in order to increase motivation and productivity.
I am wondering if there would be any push-back on the part of employees if work became so closely meshed with a part of their lives that they consider relaxing or enjoyable. Could the attempt to merge work with what is primarily a social/personal activity be heavily resisted on the part of employees? Would this impact the sacred and often difficult to manage work-life balance?
As someone who works in a K-12 educational environment I often hear students complain when teachers try to “invade” their space on social networking sites such as Facebook. Teachers are attempting to meet students where they are and teach and engage these digital natives in new ways but student’s want school to be school and social to be social.