Gamification: Profiles and engagement levers

Gamification: Profiles and engagement levers

Are you convinced that gamification can generate more commitment and motivation among your employees? Fire Tiger can implement gamification mechanisms in your organization that are adapted to your employees and relevant to your structure. Beforehand, Fire Tiger will help you define the "player" profile of your employees, as well as their engagement levers.

Identify player profiles

Aware of the challenges of gamification, some managers think they are doing the right thing by adding some gamification elements to their team management, such as points and badges. But this is not enough, it is not what motivates employees. They need to be stimulated where they will feel touched deep inside, in their temperament, in their character. The concept of Gamification is based on the careful selection of elements that motivate each player profile, while providing a very positive context.

Bartle's model

In 1996, the Englishman Richard Bartle, considered to be the "father" of gamification, defined player profiles according to the objectives they aim for in a game experience. Bartle's model distinguishes profiles according to their actions (top of the graph) or interactions (bottom of the graph) with the game environment (right of the graph) or with other players (left of the graph). There are 4 profiles: Killers, Achievers, Explorers and Socializers. While playing, an individual can combine several of these profiles. However, according to Bartle's observations, one of the four types always seems to dominate.

The Bartle's test (remains a reference today and allows you to know your player profile: Killer, Accomplisher, Explorer or Socializer:

However, while this typology has led to an awareness that there are several player profiles, it must be understood that it was created for collaborative online role-playing games and subsequently showed its limitations in a range of games for which, for example, the "killer" profile was not relevant.

The Bewizyu model

Bartle's test has therefore been adapted and moderated, at Bewizyu for example - a French digital agency - with a quick test whose result has the advantage of being enriched with an interpretation:



Amy Jo Kim's model

Recognizing the limitations of Bartle's typology, Amy Jo Kim is an expert in neuroscience, psychology and gamification, who explains on her blog why she created her social action matrix, which she has been able to use in corporate and academic settings:

In short, as Bartle himself says, there is no "ultimate model", one must adapt one's model to the context and to the use that will be made of it.

Anyway, for a manager who wants to animate his company to stimulate and motivate his teams, or simply set up a challenge, it is therefore essential toidentify the profile of his collaborators to adapt the context, balance the teams etc. He must therefore know his collaborators well, and for that, he can propose them to take a test beforehand.

The Assess First personality test

They can also take advantage of this opportunity to give their employees a more complete personality test, via the AssessFirst application, for example. Assess First offers a test that allows for a detailed analysis of three facets: personality ("shape"), motivations ("drive") and logic ("brain").

When setting objectives, the manager will be interested in the "drive" part. The test identifies in detail what motivates the employee the most and what motivates him the least, as well as the activities he prefers and finally theenvironment he seeks. The test provides the following grid, among others:

Identify the levers of engagement


Yu-Kai Chou's engagement levers

More recently, the Taiwanese Yu-Kai Chou has established an octagonal analysis, an "octalysis" which includes 8 deep motivational vectors, which he explains during this conference.

- Meaning

- Progress and Achievement

-Satisfaction through creativity

- Possession

- Social influence

- Scarcity and impatience

- Unpredictability and curiosity

- Loss and leakage

Yu-Kai Chou goes further in the analysis. He distinguishes on the one hand:

  • On the left side of the Octalysis, the elements that reflect extrinsic motivation, i.e. motivation linked to a goal, a reason or a reward,
  • on the right side of the Octalysis, the elements with intrinsic value, i.e. a motivation linked to the sole pleasure of playing, without the need for a goal or a reward.

It distinguishes on the other hand:

  • the upper part of the Octalysis, with positive or noble motivators,
  • the lower part of the Octalysis, with negative elements, which prove to be powerful but wearing on the long term.


Pentaquest's engagement levers

But there are many other acceptable models when it comes to listing engagement levers. For example, the Australian company Pentaquest, which aims to help executives and HR managers increase employee engagement, has developed the following model with 7 levers:



Gustavo F Tondello's engagement levers

We could also mention the approach of Gustavo F Tondello, currently active in Canada in the field of gamification, who has also identified levers of engagement in his "gamified design heuristic":

Like Yu-Kai Chou, Gustavo F Tondello's approach focuses on extrinsic and intrinsic motivations. But he adds a third category which concerns heuristics closely related to the context. To learn more about this model, visit hcigames.


Alexandre Duarte's commitment levers

Finally, Alexandre Duarte drew on all the available research on the subject to identify 9 engagement levers that generate emotions and are directly applicable in business:

His company Fidbak offers a quick test that allows the person who takes it to know their engagement levers in the form of a graph:




Who can help you gamify your business?

There are dozens of models and mechanisms that will allow you to "Gamify" your organization. However, we advise you to focus on the quality and relevance of the model and mechanisms you choose rather than their quantity.

Gamification can't be improvised! No matter how mature you are with regard to gamification, the Fire Tiger solution has been designed to adapt to your organization, its context and its needs, and to offer mechanics adapted to your different player profiles, with quantitative and qualitative objectives, friendly rankings where only the first X will appear, etc.

Fire Tiger helps you manage and animate the performance of all your teams in a simple and fun way and boost their commitment, all year long. For more information, please contact our team.

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