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How DirecTV Overhauled Its 800-Person IT Group With a Game
mattydread23 writes "Most gamification efforts fail. But when DirecTV wanted to encourage its IT staff to be more open about sharing failures, it created a massive internal game called F12. Less than a year later, it's got 97% participation and nearly everybody in the IT group actually likes competing. So what did DirecTV do right? The most important thing was to devote a full-time staffer to the game, and to keep updating it constantly."
Bullshit. I've seen plenty of articles like this, and I've worked at many companies that have made the same claims. All of them were bullshit. It is a condescending attempt to re-train employees. There is a Forbes article about this that is more detailed. It shows how they want employees ideas without paying them for those ideas or giving them any credit. My favorite is the quote "It is no longer enough for IT organizations to deliver and operate systems on time and on budget. Now, we must deliver competitive advantages". Well, you could knock me over with a feather. I didn't know that I should be delivering competitive advantages. I thought you were lucky if I got your email working. How about if a few Direct TV employees chime in and comment on what was in these videos that became the awesome F12 game that stirred competition between employees and increased productivity, or to quote, how management addressed your "fear of failure." I'm sure all that showed an increase in productivity earned a raise in salary.
Ok, so you got 97% of your IT guys to watch videos in exchange for Hokey tickets and other, unspecified, incentives. That is really... sad
I'll tell you now that if I send my developers a video every single one of them will watch it. With no incentive other that an implicit "this will make you a better developer." If you have to pay people to read e-mails/watch videos that leadership sends your leadership has already failed.
More importantly though there seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding about he role of IT which is to keep everything running all of the time. In other words, "fear of failure" or risk-aversion is a very good thing in your IT staff. Training them to be less risk averse is not a good thing and not something that you actually want.