1.
SNACK SIZE WORK
Gamification is dead!
Long live snack size playful work processes
Sonja.angesleva@igda.fi
A book on
the same
topic in
Finnish
(2014)

2.
This deck
• What’s so special about gaming?
• Why gamification is not the thing?
• Constant learning
• Change of work
• Game mechanics
• Snack sized process model
• Recognition and learning
• Change of work
• How to measure success?

3.
Special about gaming
1. Sharing experiences, emotions, moments
2. Trying and Failing
3. Fun
4. Mesh
5. Incremental rewards
Kids learn to
use computers
by playing
games
Humans are
playful
Games are
about
disruption,
creativity,
unexpected,
surprise…

4.
Why game mechanics?
A way to…
• Demonstrate complex issues
• Motivate to reach the next goal
• Break a bigger problem into smaller pieces
• Engage and become immersed
Four drivers make us do things:
1.
2.
3.
4.
The acquirers (gather things and status)
The defenders (defend what is theirs)
The socializers (hard-wired need to bond)
The contributors (contribute to something bigger)

5.
Using game mechanics does not mean turning work into
collecting points, achievements, challenges, bonus sectors
and boss fights.
It means applying motivating gameplay processes and
solutions into the work routines to efficiently improve
policies and make better results.

6.
Why not Gamification?
• Gamification is a carrot automata without a stick
• Gamification is too expected, badgeable & quantifiable
• That’s not fun without unexpected excitement and surprises
• There are working gamification solutions like FoldIt,
Painsquad, Zamzee, Khan Academy, crowdRise,
SuperBetter, Opower, RecycleBank
• No possibility to take those into more general use:
• To demonstrate
• To motivate by incentives
• To engage
“Gamification is used in applications and
processes to improve user engagement,
return on investment, data quality,
timeliness, and learning.”

7.
What should it be then?
• Inspire people, stretch thinking a bit further, help to realize
new alternatives and ideate in a smaller groups – in order
to start something new and improve the existing
• It is all about opening up opportunities compared to
gamification where options are merely closed
• Snack size is already the norm of modern consumer
culture
Snack size process:
1 Projects into tasks
2 Constant learning
3 “Swarms” aka small
task forces taking
responsibility
4 Unexpected
5 Utilize mesh
6 Reviews and rewards

8.
Recognition drives people to do things
• Interesting work
• Involvement
• Increased visibility
• Information sharing
• Independence (taking responsibility)
People are motivated by different incentives:
• Tangible incentives
• Cash incentives
• Social incentives
• Experience incentives

9.
Work = constant learning
• Re-examine assumptions, values, methods, policies and
•
•
•
•
•
•
practices
Develop new skills and learn from the customers
Living knowledge
On demand staffing
On demand swarms
Milestone specific
challenges
Digital driven

10.
Change of work
• Overlapping layers of life 24/7
• Millennials bring new procedures to the work
• Bigger problem middle-aged work force and their routines
• Resistance is futile
• “Every company is a technology company; every business leader is
becoming a digital leader and every person is becoming a technology
company.”
Peter Sondergaard, Gartner 2013
• Expectations are changing: work should be motivating, fun
• Work is an experience where one can express herself
• Change of work requires new processes

11.
Snack size process
Snack size process is about solving problems, clearing all
the levels, reaching new high scores – and in the end
having still all three lives left.

12.
Snack size process model
Snack size model is about introducing activity loops to work
days, splitting bigger project into smaller tasks, making every
day routines concrete challenges, giving feedback and rewards
of failures and successes, efficiently utilizing networks and
working in small groups to get things prepared for decision
making.
Key ingredients:
1. Emotion
2. Depth
3. Learning from failing
4. Network driven business
5. Snack size process
6. Brain training

13.
• Start: task carousel or
a backlog.
• Weekly cycle and project cycle.
• 4 steps: split, swarm work,
iterate and review/reward.
• The steps will be repeated over
the project lifecycle.
Basic process
Task
carousel
Review/
reward
Split
problems
into tasks
Meet to
agree and
iterate
Swarms to
prepare
ideas
Backlog
Time

14.
Learn more in Finnish:
http://haukkapalapeli.
tumblr.com/
Or
Sonja.Angesleva@igda.fi