PLAYING THE GAME OF CHANGE.
How change management gamification helped an international financial
service company energize a multi-year SAP implementation.
Setting the scene.
Enter PeopleFirm.
Nobody has ever complained that an
SAP implementation was too exciting.
And it’s even less of a riveting topic of
conversation if you’ve been talking about
it for so long that it’s become old news
before it’s even begun.
PeopleFirm quickly realized that this challenging situation was going to require something
a little more creative than a basic best practice change management solution.
That lack of excitement would be all fine
and good if you didn’t need your people
to care. But if you want people aware,
informed, trained, and ready to go at the
time of launch (and you do want all of
those things, since the success of a new
initiative is totally dependent on them),
then you absolutely must get those
people engaged.
If your first response was, “Wait, a game?? In the banking industry?” you aren’t alone. In
fact, some of the organization’s leaders were just as doubtful as you are. Bank employees
are conservative, right? They don’t play games, right?
For one international financial services
company, this situation was a reality.
When we met them, they were in year
two of a four year implementation of an
SAP module, an implementation that
wasn’t particularly popular with the 600+
impacted employees to begin with. And
since little had been rolled out to date,
those employees had long since stopped
paying attention.
The organization desperately needed
to get their people to re-engage, and
fast. They needed new energy. And, to
make matters even more complicated,
the impacted employees were a crossgenerational group spread out across the
country, many remote in home offices.
The client needed different. They needed results.
And so the Race to RE-Align game was born.
Well, wrong. They not only played the game, they gave it a life far beyond anything we’d
hoped for.
Here’s how it worked: First, a brand was created so it would be easy for people to spot the
activities that were part of the game. Then the stakeholders were divided into teams of
around 20 (grouped around immediate managers), and awarded points for a variety of
actions. Those actions weren’t random; they were chosen to support the change strategy
In other words, they were things we wanted people to do in order to get educated and
engaged. They included:
• Participating in readiness
information sessions
• Attending training sessions
• Responding to a ‘what did you
learn’ question at the end o
fa
learning video
• Taking sticker selfies
• Answering surveys
Yes, you read that right – taking selfies was one of the most popular parts of the
game. Contest designer and long-time PeopleFirmer Erin Daly called on her political
campaigning past, and had “Race to RE-Align” stickers designed as a low-budget, grassroots way to spread the word. Stakeholders got points for taking a selfie with the sticker
and emailing the picture in. While a selfie isn’t exactly necessary to get up to speed on an
SAP implementation, it was a catalyst for real enthusiasm for the game.
Sticker Selfies weren’t the only catalyst, however. Another important driver was the
friendly competition between groups. The PeopleFirm team stoked this competitive spirit
by keeping a leaderboard up to date on a dedicated Sharepoint site. People could see
their actions turn into points for their teams, and teams could see where they stood in
relation to others. That’s when it all got real.
Finally, remember that “bankers don’t play games” thought? It actually triggered one
of the most unique aspects of the game – it’s low, low budget. Because of that initial
hesitance, the PeopleFirm team kept everything on the cheap. As they say, out of necessity
comes invention. Everything was low-cost: stickers (cheap), selfies (free), email (free), and
inexpensive prizes. In the end it was bragging rights that mattered, not loot.
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2
3
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Leaders and
teams meet at the
starting line
Participate in
Leaders and managers
set the pace ... driving
participation in
change management
Participation
points will be
added and
scores will be
posted
Who is in the
lead ... Can your
team get ahead?
Winners
announced!
Earn prizes
of unspeakable
value ...
key change
management
activities to
earn points
So how well did it
all work?
The “Race to RE-Align” took on a life of its
own. Sticker selfies flooded in. The leader
that had doubted the most admitted
that he was seeing stickers everywhere.
Even teams that weren’t involved in the
competition (like the SAP implementation
team itself) asked for stickers so they could
be a part of the game that was generating
so much buzz. Ultimately, more than 400
people attended Get Ready sessions, more
than 700 attended information sessions,
more than 900 viewed the RE-Align video
(with 40% of viewers emailing about what
they learned from the video), and, most
importantly,
activities
Some key takeaways:
1. Have a leaderboard. And, as Tim Gunn would say, “use it wisely”.
2. Give stakeholders points for what they would need to do anyway as
part of the change plan – don’t waste their time.
3. Promote, promote, promote!
4. Make it simple, since people won’t pay attention if it’s too complicated.
Do all the points calculations and tabulating yourself.
5. If you believe it will work, keep the faith, and keep selling your idea until you
get buy-in. But also make sure you have a backup plan if it doesn’t work. Some
games just might not take off, and you want to be able to change course if you
have to. This is another great reason to keep things low-cost, since you won’t have
sunk a lot of investment into it before you know whether or not it will go viral.
Ditch the fancy apps!
6. Keep your teams the right size. For us it was around 20 people, all under an
immediate manager
a whopping 82% specifically
said they were ready to use the
new tools and processes.
7. Be prepared to prime the pump! You’re going to need to do a little pushing
Of course, this didn’t all happen
overnight. To get the momentum started,
the PeopleFirm team expertly primed the
pump with email updates that included
the selfies they’d received (including a
“selfie” featuring key business leaders
that they took themselves to get the
ball rolling), points updates, and emails
to team leaders designed to foster
competition. But once that ball started
rolling, the results were extraordinary.
decisions or layoffs. Games are best for getting people’s attention, not
improving morale.
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until it gets to critical mass
8. Don’t try a game in charged or hostile atmospheres, such as around unpopular
PeopleFirm is a management and HR consulting firm dedicated to helping you achieve that ultimate win-win: inspired
people driving inspiring performance. We focus on effective tools, measurable outcomes, real results, and getting your people
out of their seats and engaged in your company’s growth. We use people strategy, talent management, organizational
performance, and change management, to help you partner with your people to build an organization that excels in today’s
new world of work. People are your last competitive frontier. Make them count.
Your people = your success.
Seattle | Portland | Vancouver