Understanding the effectiveness of gamification in an industrial work process: an experimental approach

Purpose In this paper, the authors report the findings of an experiment on the effectiveness of gamification on work performance in a real industrial workplace setting with monotonous, repetitive work. Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted an experiment with a simple gamification application that the authors added to a given information system and compared the work performance of an experimental group ( n = 16) with a control group ( n = 15) over a period of one month. Findings The results of the authors’ experiment show that gamification of the workplace leads to a measurable improvement of work performance, creates prevailingly positive emotions and increases the motivation of the workers. Research limitations/implications The authors’ findings provide reasons for conducting future research on the contiguity of gamification and the Hawthorne effect or similar phenomena. In this regard, it also seems necessary to take a closer look at who is really affected by a gamified environment and what the boundaries of the gamified environment are. Practical implications The authors demonstrate that gamification is a useful tool for process improvement. Furthermore, our results are helpful for a more successful implementation of gamification. Originality/value Gamification has proven to be effective in a large number of application contexts, such as education, health and crowdsourcing. Despite the generally positive evaluation of its effectiveness, gamification is still thought to work differently in different contexts. Therefore, there is a gap in the literature on this topic with respect to real industrial workplaces. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the authors are among the first to have conducted a gamification experiment in a real industrial context.