Gamification: Combining Fun and Learning in Millennial Onboarding

Each generation of workers has its strengths but the generation that is currently ruling the roost in organizations across the globe is the millennials. You have given your new millennial employees a warm welcome, you have also shown them the coolest coffee shops around office. Now it’s time to get them acquainted with the company’s culture, its policies, and procedures. Make the millennials sit in a classroom listening to someone drone on what’s expected from them on the job, and you are sure to find yourself with a grumpy workforce.

Millennials tend to like workplace fun more than the previous generations. Gamification is a strategy that can be used to create impressive millennial onboarding courses. Here are the reasons you need to try gamification in onboarding:

• Millennials have been brought up in the digital era and love to have fun even while learning.
• They have a short attention span and this means they are looking for action and instant gratification.
• They love to stay in control of their learning and rewards and benefits are a must-have.

Gamification of online training programs is one way to spice up your millennial onboarding program and here’s how it can help.

Creates a Positive Image of the Company

The onboarding process is the first opportunity for the company to make an impression on the new hires. Millennials are known to form impressions quickly and if your onboarding program is old-fashioned and boring, that’s the perception they will have about the company as well. In a millennial onboarding program you would want new hires to learn about the company’s history, its vision, products, and services. Gamification offers a cool way to present this information and build brand awareness in new hires.

Delivers Effective Feedback

During the first week of onboarding, your millennial new hires are getting used to the organization’s culture, its values, and beginning to develop a sense of their day-to-day responsibilities at work. Do not be under the impression that the onboarding process does not require a feedback. Millennials look for constant feedback and would want to know how they have progressed in the onboarding program.

Gamification can be used to provide instant feedback to millennials. How about a game-based assessment to test the understanding of millennials. You can have quizzes and trivia contests to gauge their understanding and provide constructive feedback. 

Improves Engagement Levels

Your millennial onboarding program needs to be fun and interactive, and not a one-way communication. Incorporate videos, team-oriented games, and constructive feedback throughout the e-learning course. Millennials are sure to love the interactivity, multimedia, colorful graphics, and the ability to progress to different levels in the online onboarding process. You could apply a gamification strategy where access to the next level in the millennial onboarding training is granted only after the employee completes one level.

If new hires are encouraged to participate in the training, they are more likely to retain information. Design milestones to be achieved in the millennial onboarding course and set timelines for completion. On the successful completion of each level, learners can be awarded points or certificates.

Fosters Motivation

Millennials need to be motivated to complete the online onboarding course. They are not content with knowing what they need to learn, they also need to know why they need to learn. Gamification taps into intrinsic forms of motivation such as competency, autonomy, and emotional needs, and encourages participation in the millennial onboarding course. Badges, leaderboards, and performance graphs are a few assets used in a gamified course to motivate millennials to learn.

A leaderboard that displays the learner’s progress in comparison with other learners fosters a competitive spirit and motivates them to complete the online onboarding course.

Gives Learners Control

Millennials like to learn but they do not like being told how to learn. So, it certainly makes sense to use gamification in millennial onboarding. When the online training is gamified, participation is voluntary. Tell them what’s expected from them and let them get started on a journey of exploration and discovery. With gamification, learners feel in control of the learning process as they complete levels and unlock further levels in the onboarding process.

Using gamification in the millennial onboarding course opens up possibilities for an engaging and refreshing onboarding program. Millennials look forward to taking ownership of their learning tasks and outcomes, and what better way than gamification to fulfill their desire. Are you ready to take the millennials on an online learning adventure with gamification?