Are you looking for a way to boost motivation, spark creativity, and make your workplace more fun? Look no further than gamification for employee engagement! Gamification transforms the daily grind into an adventure through interaction and meaningful incentives. Read on as we share how to successfully roll out employee engagement gamification.
Workplace gamification is more than just a trend—it’s a powerful strategy to supercharge engagement, drive productivity, and make work more fun. By incorporating game-like elements into daily routines, you can ignite a competitive spirit, boost morale, and create a more vibrant, committed workforce. Whether it’s through leaderboards or team challenges, gamification has the power to energize your team, strengthen connections, and fast-track progress.
In this post, we’ll explore the concept of employee engagement and gamification, its benefits, best practices, and share 10 of the best gamification ideas.
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What is Gamification in the Workplace?
Gamification for employee engagement uses game design elements, like point scoring, badges, or leaderboards, to motivate teams. The main goal is to make routine tasks more engaging by incorporating elements of play and competition—encouraging employees to participate more actively.
Benefits of Gamification on Employee Engagement
When work feels like play, everyone wins. From driving collaboration and increasing productivity to fostering a culture of recognition and continuous improvement, here’s how gamification can boost engagement and transform your workplace:
Increases motivation and productivity: Employee engagement gamification taps into your staff’s intrinsic desire for competition and progress, encouraging them to stay focused and perform their best.
Encourages teamwork and collaboration: Gamified activities encourage collaboration—enhancing team dynamics and building stronger relationships cross-departmentally.
Provides continuous feedback: Gamification provides continuous feedback by using real-time scoring, badges, and progress tracking, allowing employees to see immediate results and understand their performance.
Supports goal achievement: By breaking down larger objectives into manageable, game-like tasks, employees will feel motivated to complete them efficiently—especially when rewards are involved!
Creates a positive culture: Gamification creates a positive culture in the workplace by making tasks enjoyable and promoting a sense of achievement and recognition among employees.
Enhances learning and development: Interactive and game-based learning tools make training more engaging—helping employees absorb and retain information.
Best Practices for Internal Gamification
To reap the maximum benefits and impact of gamification on employee engagement, it’s essential to implement it effectively. Here are some best practices to adopt in your workplace:
Align gamification with company goals: Ensure that the gamified elements align with the organization’s objectives and values. For instance, if your goal is to improve communication, consider gamifying tasks that encourage open dialogue and employee feedback, like dialogue bingo or idea pitch competitions.
Keep it simple: Overcomplicating the game mechanics can lead to confusion and disengagement. Start with simple game elements that are easy to understand and participate in.
Offer meaningful rewards: Ensure that the rewards offered are meaningful to employees. This could range from recognition to tangible rewards like gift cards or extra time off. If you’re not sure, ask your teams for their input.
Encourage voluntary participation: Gamification should be optional, not mandatory. Employees should feel motivated to participate without feeling any added pressure.
Monitor and measure success: Regularly assess the effectiveness of your internal gamification trends and strategies using performance metrics like participation rates, engagement scores, or employee feedback surveys.
Check out our article for more creative employee engagement ideas here.
10 Best Gamification Ideas for Employee Engagement
According to one study, gamification is already gaining popularity, especially when it comes to training employees. The gamification market is projected to grow by 27% between 2020 to 2025.
Here are 10 innovative gamification ideas for employee engagement that boost employee engagement, enhance learning, and promote teamwork.
1. Employee onboarding quests
What: Employee onboarding quests are an employee engagement gamification strategy designed to make the onboarding process more engaging and less overwhelming for new hires.
Why: By transforming the traditional onboarding experience into a series of missions, new employees can explore their roles, learn about company culture and connect with other team members in an interactive way. This approach breaks down information-heavy onboarding processes into manageable, game-like chunks.
Example: Let’s say you implement a “Meet Your Team” quest that encourages new employees to connect with at least three team members within their first week, complete a brief questionnaire, and share a fun fact about themselves. Showcase the results in the following newsletter to create a sense of community and inclusion from day one.
With ContactMonkey, you can design an employee newsletter for new hires that details the whole onboarding process. Include any gamification tasks, like digital onboarding scavenger hunts, mentorship points, or team integration challenges. Our platform allows you to build personalized templates right in your Outlook or Gmail—and reuse your new employee emails for future use.
For more tips, read our employee onboarding checklist here.
2. Competitive sales leaderboards
What: Sales leaderboards are a popular employee engagement gamification technique that displays real-time rankings based on key performance indicators (KPIs), like sales numbers, new client acquisitions, or revenue generated.
Why: Sales leaderboards create a transparent and competitive environment that pushes employees to perform at their best—adding an element of excitement and fun to the sales process.
Example: Imagine a sales manager at your company uses a sales leaderboard to boost motivation on the team. But, you want to gamify it even further. To encourage sustained effort, introduce tiered challenges or themed contests, like “Top Closer of the Week” or “Most New Clients in a Month.” These specific challenges add variety and motivate different types of sales behaviors, allowing multiple employees to earn recognition. These are just a few ways companies are using gamification for employee engagement!
3. Skill development tournaments
What: These types of tournaments transform skill-building into a competitive and engaging experience, where employees participate in challenges or tasks related to specific skills—like coding, design, communication, or data analysis.
Why: By competing in a tournament format, employees are motivated to enhance their abilities, demonstrate their expertise, and strive for excellence. This not only closes the skills gap, but creates a culture of learning and innovation within the organization.
Example: Imagine you have a tech company and want to help develop your employees’ coding skills. Every quarter you could organize a “Coding Tournament” where staff compete against each other in solving coding challenges, debugging exercises, or developing small applications within a set amount of time. Winners of each round advance to the next stage, while those who perform exceptionally well earn badges or recognition for specific skills, like “Fastest Coder” or “Best Debugger.”
Bonus tip: After each training tournament, follow up with post-training survey questions to improve your engagement strategy for your employees in the future.
4. Health and wellness competitions
What: Health and wellness competitions are a popular form of gamification for employee engagement strategy. The aim is to promote a healthy lifestyle among employees while cultivating a sense of community and engagement. These competitions turn healthy habits into a fun and competitive challenge—encouraging employees to take active steps towards better physical and mental well-being.
Why: When employees are healthy and feel supported in their well-being, they are more engaged, motivated, and less likely to experience burnout—leading to a more resilient workforce and driving stronger business success.
Example: Let’s say you launch a “Step Challenge” where employees compete to achieve the highest number of steps over a period of time—on an individual or team level. Participants can use different fitness or step trackers to record their daily steps, with the data automatically syncing to a company-wide leaderboard.
Once the steps competition is completed, send out an employee newsletter and feature a section with the winning team. This will not only motivate your employees to get stepping, but help boost engagement with your newsletters too.
5. Peer recognition programs
What: This form of gamification and employee engagement leverages the power of social recognition to motivate employees and enhance workplace culture. Unlike traditional top-down recognition from managers, peer recognition programs encourage employees to acknowledge and appreciate each other’s contributions, achievements, and positive behaviors.
Why: This boosts overall company morale and enhances team dynamics in the workplace. By gamifying this process—through points, badges, or rewards—organizations create a culture of support and camaraderie.
Example: Implement a digital peer recognition program where employees award points or kudos to colleagues who’ve demonstrated outstanding performance, helpfulness, creativity, or teamwork. Your employees can nominate peers for specific categories, like “Collaboration Champion” or “Innovative Thinker.”
Check out our other employee recognition ideas here for more inspiration.
6. Trivia and game quizzes
What: Trivia and game quizzes are a fun and interactive gamification and engagement strategy that enhances knowledge-sharing and team bonding in the workplace.
Why: By turning learning and information retention into a game, employees are encouraged to participate, compete, and collaborate in a relaxed and enjoyable environment. Trivia and quizzes will cover a wide range of topics, from company policies and history to industry trends and general company knowledge.
Example: Try these trivia topics for your next “Friday Trivia Challenge” at your workplace. Below are trivia topics to use and some sample questions for each category:
Products and services sample questions:
1. What year was our flagship product launched?
2. Which of our services has the highest customer satisfaction rating?
3. What is the name of our latest product feature or update?
Health and safety compliance sample questions:
1. Where is the nearest emergency exit located from your workstation?
2. How often are employees required to complete mandatory safety training?
3. What is the company’s policy for reporting workplace accidents or injuries?
Tech and innovation sample questions:
1. What problem or challenge does our product solve for our clients?
2. Which team is leading the development of our new software solution?
3. What technology stack is our core product built on?
Employee fun facts and trivia sample questions:
1. Which employee has run a marathon on every continent?
2. Who won the company’s last costume contest?
3. Who has the most pets, and what are they?
With ContactMonkey, create email templates dedicated to trivia and game quizzes with the help of our email template builder. Simple drag-and-drop your rows and content into the body of your email and add interactive buttons, polls, emoji reacts, and more.
If you plan to incorporate trivia into your employee engagement action plan, set up recurring surveys so they get sent automatically—making employee engagement and gamification less time-consuming.
7. Hackathons and innovation challenges
What: Hackathons and innovation challenges are dynamic gamification for employee engagement strategies that promote out-of-the-box thinking and problem-solving in the workplace.
Why: These events provide staff with the opportunity to come together, usually across departments, to develop new ideas, or create innovative solutions within a set timeframe—ultimately pushing the business forward.
Example: Imagine you organize a “48-hour Innovation Challenge” where employees are invited to form cross-functional teams and develop new ideas or prototypes that address a specific business need or challenge—like enhancing customer experience or improving internal processes. Start the challenge with a brainstorming session where teams pitch ideas, followed by intensive work sessions to refine the solutions, followed by a business pitch to the whole company.
Common examples of challenges to address include:
Product Innovation Challenge
- Objective: Teams must brainstorm and present an idea for a new product or service that aligns with the company’s goals
- Judging criteria: Creativity, feasibility, market demand, alignment with company values, and presentation quality
- Duration: 1-2 hours for brainstorming and 5-10 minutes per team for presentation
- Prize idea: Innovation award or development support for the winning idea
Sales Pitch Showdown
- Objective: Each team is given a product (real or fictional) and must create a compelling sales pitch to “sell” it to a panel of judges
- Judging criteria: Persuasiveness, clarity, creativity, and ability to address customer needs
- Duration: 1 hour for preparation, 5 minutes for the pitch per team
- Prize idea: Best Pitch Award and a fun team experience
Customer Experience Improvement Challenge
- Objective: Teams are tasked with identifying a common pain point in the customer journey and coming up with a plan to improve it
- Judging criteria: Practicality, cost-efficiency, and potential for impact on customer satisfaction
- Duration: 1-2 hours for ideation and a 5-minute presentation per team
- Prize idea: Best Solution Award
8. Customer experience simulations
What: Using customer experience simulations as a form of gamification to improve employee engagement is an effective way to allow employees to practice and refine their customer service skills in a controlled, interactive environment.
Why: These simulations mimic real-life customer scenarios, enabling employees to develop effective strategies for handling different types of customer complaints or requests. This helps boost communication skills and ensures high-quality customer experiences across all touchpoints.
Example: To implement this employee engagement strategy, you could create a “Customer Service Escape Room” simulation for their customer support team. In this simulation, employees work in small groups to solve a series of customer service challenges within a set time limit.
Here’s how to implement the above challenge:
- Define your objectives and outcomes
- Plan and design challenges
- Select your teams—across departments
- Create physical or virtual escape rooms
- Design challenge materials and assign roles
- Set up feedback and evaluation
- Award prizes and recognition
9. Gamified employee feedback loops
What: Feedback loops are designed to make the employee feedback process more engaging and actionable in the workplace. Traditional feedback methods can feel formal and disconnected from everyday activities.
Why: Gamifying the employee feedback loop introduces interactive elements like pulse surveys, employee net promoter score (eNPS) surveys, and polls to gather input. Instead of passively consuming content, employees are prompted to actively participate with your newsletter, turning what could be a routine read into a more interactive experience.
Example: If you want to boost employee engagement in the workplace, try incentivizing them by assigning points to employees each time they complete a survey or participate in a feedback session. Or, up the stakes even further and allow employees to redeem accumulated points for tangible rewards like extra vacation hours or company merchandise.
With internal communications software like ContactMonkey, you create a two-way communication channel with your employees. With our email template builder, use our drag-and-drop your content into your emails and include your survey questions, suggestion boxes, or anonymous comments. From here, send out emails to your staff and ask their opinions on the implementation of gamification in your workplace. Based on this feedback, you make any necessary changes to your gamification for employee engagement strategy.
10. Storytelling and creative writing projects
What: One innovative approach is to use storytelling and creative writing projects as a form of gamification in the workplace. This method taps into employees’ imagination and encourages them to engage with their work and colleagues in new and meaningful ways.
Why: By integrating creative storytelling into your gamification strategy, you tap into the innate human love for narratives, making work more engaging and fulfilling. Employees also enhance communication and presentation skills and strengthen teamwork.
Example: Host monthly or quarterly storytelling contests where employees write short narratives related to company projects, values, or goals. Offer rewards for the most impactful stories or have your teams vote for their favorite piece.
Let’s break down the key steps:
Step 1: Form teams of three to six and ensure it’s a mix of members from different departments or roles to bring varied perspectives.
Step 2: Assign a theme or writing prompt so your employees can have a kickstart. For instance, ask your teams to write a narrative about where the company will be in ten years or develop a script showcasing an exceptional customer service scenario.
Step 3: Set clear guidelines and expectations. Define the expected output, the deadline, and what writing elements should be included—like characters, conflict, and a resolution.
Step 4: Have your teams present to the wider company and staff can award points or vote for their favorite narrative.
Boost Gamification and Employee Engagement With ContactMonkey
The impact of gamification on employee engagement can’t be understated. According to Zippia, 90% of employees say gamification makes them feel more motivated and productive at work. Using gamification to increase employee engagement transforms your workplace culture, enhances productivity, and creates a more engaged workforce. By understanding the benefits, following best practices, and leveraging creative gamification ideas, your organization can create a dynamic and motivated team ready to achieve new heights.
With an internal communications email tool like ContactMonkey, you can embrace the power of gamification for your employees. Seamlessly integrate our software into your Outlook or Gmail inboxes and create engaging internal communications for your teams to explain how the gamification activities work and what teams need to do. From interactive polls, employee feedback surveys, suggestion boxes, emoji reacts to Likert scales, we help companies measure the true impact of gamification in the workplace.
Ready to unlock new opportunities by adopting gamification as an engagement strategy and drive business success?
ContactMonkey’s all-in-one internal communications software helps you try out new gamification trends and strategies to boost employee engagement. See what works, and ditch what doesn’t. To see how our solution drives employee engagement with workplace gamification, book your free demo today.
