Gamification of learning is widely adopted across IT organizations in India, but challenges remain

Soma Tah

Learning preferences of professionals are changing with time and a majority of the IT professionals in India find online learning more effective than traditional offline training. To keep up with the learning styles of the employees, a lot of organizations are also infusing game elements into the learning and training processes.

A recently released study by Pluralsight found that 90 percent of IT organizations are implementing gamification in learning and 78 percent of organizations confirm that gamified learning is of both high importance and high relevance.
The study also found that 69 percent of the IT professionals in India find online learning more effective than traditional offline training. The reasons are varied, but flexibility to learn anytime through multiple devices is the top reason among them.

For the study commissioned by Pluralsight, market research firm, Kantar IMRB surveyed 568 IT professionals across Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Pune, NCR, Kolkata and Ahmedabad on how an IT professional in India likes to learn. It also surveyed 106 IT companies across the services and product space and looks at how the IT industry is making learning interesting with gamification.

Arun Rajamani, Country GM at Pluralsight India said, “Learning styles have changed over time and are becoming online, personalized and byte-sized. Online learning will play a key role in helping the IT industry reduce the skills gap by helping them assess their skills, find or build the right learning paths, get instant expert help and apply learning interactive labs. Learning must also be made interesting. It is exciting to see the rise of gamification in learning in India. Gamification brings in the 3 elements of progression, pride and play into learning and promotes a socially inclusive culture.”

The study also busts the myth that gamification is only for younger employees, as it finds that 47 percent of the IT industry considers employees with eight or more years of experience as the target audience for gamification, while 37 percent considers employees with 0–8 years as the target audience.

Source: Pluralsight

“Skill development and learning is the key for all level of employees in today’s dynamic technology and business scenario. However, employees are not keen to go through traditional learning program because of several reasons such as paucity of time, ineffective teaching, boredom, etc. This is where online learning can play a major role. Gamified learning not only makes the learning process more of fun activity, it also increases learner engagement and effectiveness. If implemented in right manner, gamified learning will enhance the overall learning experience for all experience brackets,” said Indranil Dutta, Account Director, Kantar IMRB.

While gamified learning motivate employees through a novel learning approach and helps to create better workplace collaboration, the study also points out some challenges associated with deriving the desired outcome from gamified learning. For example, poor game design might often fail to align with the desired objectives. Sometimes it can also distract employees from their job and also has a chance to become uninteresting after a certain period of time and when some employees don’t take it seriously enough, it jeopardizes the return on investment.

Source: Pluralsight

The most essential part is linking the game experience with learning objectives. Linking the gaming platforms effectively to existing learning systems and training employees are also crucial to ensure effective implementation of it.

The study also found that IT networking, web development and JavaScript are the top three skill areas for learning in 2017.