Utilizing design thinking approach to explore gamification of skill assessment to improve employee engagement and staffing
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Journal Title
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Volume Title
School of Business |
Master's thesis
Authors
Date
2021
Department
Major/Subject
Mcode
Degree programme
Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management
Language
en
Pages
131
Series
Abstract
As a result of COVID-19 crisis, now more than ever companies need solutions to engage their em- ployees, especially solutions that can achieve engagement remotely. Since work gamification can be a powerful tool to boost employee engagement, especially in digital environments, it has never been more important to understand how exactly gamification can be used in organisations and how to introduce it successfully. This thesis is practically-oriented research and the goal was to answer practically-relevant questions and solve real-life research problems rather than developing a theory. The goal of this study was to explore how to effectively apply gamification in CV tool (employee skill assessment tool) redesign for Finland based technology company to improve employee engagement and staffing. It also aimed to explore how design thinking techniques can support development of gamified tool for such em- ployee skill assessment tool. The literature review provides insights into work gamification and its challenges, as well as overview of different design thinking methods and their shortcomings. These findings are used to develop a research design which serves as a practically relevant framework for developing a gamified solu- tion/tool which has been developed by synthesizing various design thinking and gamification meth- ods and frameworks. The primary research includes 14 in-depth interviews and one workshop. The main limitation includes time restrictions, which is why the research was limited to inspiration and ideation parts of the research design. The developed recommendations were not prototyped, tested and eventually implemented. As a result, the effectiveness of these recommendations was not ana- lysed and confirmed. Furthermore, the research was limited by one case study, which reduces ability to generalize the findings and they cannot be directly applied to other cases. The results of this thesis include practically relevant framework for developing a gamified solu- tion/tool which has been developed by synthesizing various methods and frameworks and research- tested practically relevant recommendations for the case company on how to leverage gamification to gamify elements of the CV tool to improve user engagement and improve motivation to use the tool. These recommendations are complemented with some practical steps and all of it is summa- rized in a step plan which is developed utilizing design thinking framework. To summarise the main implications of this thesis include advanced knowledge about work gamifi- cation, developing gamified software, it's challenges and how design thinking can be used in the process of developing gamified tool for skill assessment.Description
Thesis advisor
Heikkilä, Jukka-PekkaKeywords
gamification, design thinking, skill assessment, venture staffing, employee engagement, talent management, gamified software