An increasing number of companies are adapting the principles of gamification to take their recruitment processes to the next level and increase the likelihood of finding candidates with the right skills and attitudes.

1. hello
Talented People
The Gamification of Recruitment
Market Watch, August 2016

2. Contents
4 What is gamification
Why gamify the recruitment process
Gamification best practice
Case studies
23 What next for gamification
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9
16
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Game

3. Introduction
An increasing number of companies are adopting the principles of gamification to take their
recruitment processes to the next level and increase the likelihood of finding candidates with the
right skills and attitudes. Some recruiters are embracing gamification with some really innovative
approaches.
Gamification is currently being applied across many facets of the employment experience, not just
recruitment – from employee performance, training, and innovation management, to personal
development, sustainability and health and wellness – the list continues to grow. But gamification
is very misunderstood.
It’s easy to misunderstand because it is a broad term that touches on interface design, user
experience design and even psychology. Understood correctly though and it can be highly
successful in engaging candidates and getting them to think “this company is for me and I’d like to
work here”.
Microsoft improved its translations for the Windows OS through the Language Quality game, with
over 900 employees completing 26 000 tasks with 170 additional errors reported.
Volkswagen registered 33 million webpage hits and 119 000 ideas through its People’s Car Project
that lets people design their perfect car.
So it’s worth investing the time to understand gamification properly and how to do it right. The
following document looks at what is gamification and more importantly what it is not; how to do it
right and how other companies have successfully gamified their recruitment processes. We hope
you find this useful and even better that it inspires you to use gamification to drive impact in your
recruitment process.

4. Gamification is the application of game mechanics and design in
a non-game context. It involves applying the elements of
competition, point-scoring, badges and role play in a marketing,
project management or recruitment context.
“People rushed in and thought it
was about adding a game to the
recruitment process, which
wasn’t quite right…What we are
really talking about are the
dynamics of engagement”, Matt
Jeffery, SAP vice president,
global head of sourcing and
employment brand, HR talent
acquisition
Gamification is not…
The addition of a game to a non-game
context.
What is gamification

5. It gives candidates real insight into the tasks and skills
involved in the job, helping them self-select on whether
this is the right career for them
It personalises, humanises and adds fun to the recruitment process
It showcases that the brand believes in innovation and creativity
It encourages candidates to engage with the brand at a deeper
level than is possible in an ordinary recruitment process
It can test aptitude for the job, increasing the likelihood of finding
candidates with the right skills, and a good fit for the brand
It can attract candidates who may not
have otherwise considered the brand
Why gamify the recruitment process
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Finish

6. Gamification enables employers to
better connect with millennials
Attracting good quality young talent
is one of the biggest challenges faced
by today’s employers – gamification
helps meet this challenge.
Hiring managers have observed that
used effectively, gamification can
attract and assess candidates from
the generation raised on consoles like
Wii and Xbox i.e. Generation Y also
known as Millennials.

7. The UK is highly attuned to game mechanics
GameTrack estimate there are 18.8m
people aged between 6 and 64 playing
games in the UK, or 40% of the population.
(GameTrack, 2016 Q1).
On average, 11 to 64 year-
olds spend 8.8 hours per week
playing games (GameTrack, 2016 Q1).
Spain 5.8
Germany 7.9
France 6.6
UK 8.8
Average weekly hours of
gaming (in # hours, 11-64
year olds)

8. Further reasons to gamify recruitment
Hiring managers who have used gamification have found it to be a
particularly useful way of testing for specific personality traits that would
otherwise be difficult to check. It enables recruiters to assess candidates’
drive for innovation, their ability to problem solve, and their capacity to
perform under pressure.
A gamified recruitment process works well in sectors where there is a
shortage of skilled candidates or where competition for qualified
candidates is very high.

9. Gamification – Best Practice

10. Gamification best practice
Opinion polls, candidate surveys and page ratings can all be used to increase impact
and interaction, while league tables and leader boards ensure an element of competition.
Build gamification into multiple
candidate touchpoints. Include social
media channels and careers sites.
Keep content simple, interactive,
stimulating and entertaining.

11. Gamification best practice
Feature characters that the candidate is
likely to identify with. They are more likely
then to think “this company is like me and
I’d like to join”
The mistake some companies make is to
“broadcast” what they see as their selling
points to potential candidates. They say
‘look at us, we’re a great place to work’ or
‘look at how great our results are’. But they
don’t engage, listen or join the real
conversation.

12. Gamification best practice
Matt Lasky, creative team leader at
recruitment marketing and digital
branding company 4MAT, believes
LinkedIn is the master of this: “When
you go onto your LinkedIn profile you
have a profile strength bar on it.
You’re constantly being encouraged to
reach a new goal and improve your
profile strength by performing
different tasks to provide them with
better quality information about you.”
To be effective,
gamification strategies
must have targets built
into them and the
candidate must be
encouraged to meet
them.

13. Gamification best practice
“I have recently implemented a gamification version of
a referral scheme and this works by receiving points
every time you refer someone, and if that person gets
an interview you get more points.”
Matt Lasky
Many recruiters and employers have referral schemes linked to
reward. Matt Lasky of recruitment marketing and digital
branding company 4MAT believes gamification can take the
reward element of referral schemes to the next level and
increase their effectiveness.

14. Gamification best practice
Many elements that can be used in
gamification are trackable such as
likes and shares and leagues and
leader boards but it’s vital to
understand exactly what you want
and need to measure.
Don’t track something just because
you can – track only those things
that will actually tell you if you have
met your recruitment goals.
Have clear goals about what you are measuring

15. Gamification best practice
The challenges included in a gamified recruitment process must be aligned
with the skills specifically needed for the role.
“Game simulations that reflect what the
work really looks like can be very
effective, whether playing against
yourself or other people,” Katherine
Jones, vice president of human capital
management technology research
at Bersin by Deloitte

16. TWI Case Study

17. Ericsson – Build the networked society
TWI created this game which has been used to promote the Ericsson employer
brand in a number of ways. It has been used internally to encourage
employees to re-engage with the employer brand and to promote Employee
Referral.
The game microsite was
launched in June 2016.
Results from June to Dec
2016:
• 16,430 page views
• 6,242 sessions
• 4,898 users
The game has been
played in more than 100
countries.

18. Case studies
Companies successfully gamifying
their recruitment

19. Shell has developed a game called
“The Shell Explorer Game” to
enhance its recruitment process. The
game is available on their career page.
It works by inviting potential employees
to tackle various problem-solving
quizzes and challenges that reflect the
type of work the successful candidate
would be expected to perform in the
role. Shell uses gamification primarily to
determine if the applicant is skilled and
motivated enough.
Shell Google
Google has run a Google Code
Jam software-writing competition for
12 years as a way to find fresh, new
talent with the right skills for the job.
Potential candidates compete to win
monetary prizes up to $50,000.

20. British intelligence and security agency,
GCHQ has created an encrypted
message on a
website CanYouCrackIt.co.uk and used
it as part of their application process.
Candidates had to crack the code and
decipher what the hidden message was
in order to advance in the recruitment
process.
It gave applicants a sense if they were
up for the challenge of the job, and
GCHQ was able to weed out unsuitable
candidates.
GCHQFormapost
The French postal service Formapost was
struggling to retain new hires. The drop out
rate for new hires was 25%.
To address this, Formaposte launched Jeu
Facteur Academy, which allowed potential
candidates to spend a week in the life of a
new hire postal carrier. They experienced
getting up early in the morning and they
learnt about postal work and the ethics of
the job.
The drop-out rate for new hires went from
25% to 8% after the game was introduced in
the hiring process, and the company found
candidates were better prepared for the role.

21. Domino’s Pizza Mogul game has
potential employees create and name
their own ideas for pizzas and toppings,
and then for every item sold they get
certain monetary rewards. This is
designed to show potential job
candidates that the company is
innovative, creative, fun, embraces new
ideas.
Dominos Umbel
The big-data start-up Umbel has a gaming
challenge called “Umbelmania,” in which
potential candidates fight a series of
opponents in a first-person fighter-style
game. Their movements are coded and they
win points.
The points each candidate wins determine
how far they advance through the
interviewing process. Candidates who may
not have known just how solid their coding
skills are can see how they match up
against opponents, and then see how well
suited they are to the job.

22. The Hungary division of
PriceWaterhousecoopers has developed a 12-
day online simulation called Multipoly. This invites
students onto Facebook to experience a virtual
version of what it’s like to work for the firm.
Students must meet quarterly goals and
accomplish tasks based on PwC competencies
while receiving feedback from company coaches.
“It provides insight into the audit and consulting
profession in a fun way and builds engagement,”
Noemi Biro, PwC’s recruitment leader in Budapest.
According to Biro, 78 percent of students surveyed
said they wanted to work for PwC after completing
the game. Ninety-two percent had a more positive
view of the firm. The game has also contributed to
a significant increase in the number of job
applicants.
PWC

23. What’s next for the gamification
of recruitment

24. “There are many reasons for this, starting with the lack of clearly defined
business objectives, or focusing on the organization goals rather than the
player goals.”
Industry commentators say it’s highly
unlikely that gamified strategies will
completely replace traditional
recruitment tactics in the
future. Effective execution of
gamification of the recruitment process
is still work in progress for most
companies – at this stage only a
minority can say, hand on heart, that
they have achieved all of their
gamification objectives. Brian Burke,
who recently published a book on the
topic, Gamify — ”How Gamification
Motivates People to Do Extraordinary
Things” has a theory why this is the
case:

25. So expect to see companies embrace a mix of traditional
recruitment methods and gamification – a wholesale shift
towards gamification is not on the cards. The next few
years will probably see many companies take stock of
their gamified recruitment process is going in and ask
themselves if it’s going in the right direction.
It’s likely that more and more companies will come to
realise that the key to effective gamification is to focus
less on what the business wants and more on what drives
and motivates the candidates. This will lead to a more
candidate-centric approach.
Market research will be critical to understanding the goals
of the “player” and pinpointing how to lure them into the
gamified recruitment process. It will become an
increasingly key tool for companies that aspire to have a
more candidate-centric approach to their gamified
recruitment process. As such, over the next few years
we’re likely to see an increase in demand for market
research as a method of helping companies to optimise
gamification of recruitment processes.

26. thanksfor listening