10 Gamification ideas for training: How to engage your learners

To address the challenges of training and engaging employees effectively, many businesses are turning to the idea of gamification. Gamification is the integration of game-like mechanics and design principles into non-game contexts. It’s proven to be a powerful tool for transforming training programs. 

By tapping into our inherent human desire for achievement and competition, gamification can transform mundane training tasks into engaging and motivating experiences for your team. This article delves into innovative gamification ideas for training that your learners will surely enjoy.

What are common examples of gamification?

Gamification is all about making learning and tasks more enjoyable through game-like elements. Here are some common examples:

• Stories - This gamification example allows your team members to immerse themselves in interactive narratives where they can actively participate in the learning journey.
• Competitions - With this example, your employees can engage in friendly contests against peers, fostering a sense of accomplishment and healthy rivalry.
• Challenges - Here, your staff can tackle various tasks and missions that mimic real-life scenarios, enhancing their problem-solving skills.
• Game-style Quizzes - This tests their understanding of learned concepts through quizzes designed with game elements that make assessments more entertaining.
• Rewards - With this gamification example, you’ll allow your team to earn incentives, badges, or points for completing tasks, amplifying motivation and a sense of achievement.

Now that you have a clearer picture of some common gamification examples, let’s dive deeper into more specific gamification ideas for training. These can help you captivate your learners and enhance their skills through immersive gameplay experiences. 

Gamification idea for training #1 - Leaderboards

With leaderboards, employees are given a transparent and measurable way to measure their progress against their peers. This transparency can be motivating as it creates a positive and healthy sense of rivalry. 

For example, in a sales team, having a leaderboard that showcases the top salespeople can encourage others to step up their game and strive for higher results. This kind of competition pushes individuals to continuously improve and innovate, leading to increased productivity and performance across the board.

Moreover, this gamification strategy taps into individuals' inherent competitive nature, encouraging them to excel and push their boundaries. By framing training and tasks as challenges to excel in, your employees are more likely to approach their work with enthusiasm and vigor.

EdApp is the ultimate gamified training platform that’s jam-packed with exciting gamification features. One of its most impressive offerings is the Leaderboards feature, which lets you encourage friendly competition by creating individual leaderboards for learners to go head-to-head. 

But that's not all – you can also foster teamwork and collaboration by setting up group leaderboards, inspiring your team members to complete their training quickly and aim for high rankings on the leaderboard.

Try EdApp at absolutely no cost and captivate your learners with a range of gamification ideas for training!

Gamification idea for training #2 - Simulation-based training

Sometimes, training can feel like diving into a deep ocean of information. But what if your team members could swim through realistic scenarios and make decisions that actually matter? Simulation-based training can make that happen. With it, they’ll get to test their decision-making skills in a risk-free environment, helping them better learn from mistakes.

There are many ways that you can implement simulation-based training, including virtual reality training, role-playing sessions, and scenario-focused exercises. These gamification ideas can all be incredibly effective methods for passing on important knowledge and skills to learners.

If you're looking to create realistic workplace scenarios that can help your employees solve problems, EdApp comes to the rescue with the ultimate solution for you. 

Through this business gamification app’s Template Library, you can use the Chat template as a scenario-based learning tool. This way, your team can answer multiple-choice type questions related to different scenarios that they might face at work.

Gamification idea for training #3 - Quest-based learning or challenges

Quest-based learning brings a touch of excitement to employee development by offering a series of engaging challenges. By overcoming challenges, employees step up their expertise and climb new levels of knowledge. As employees progress, they’ll be able to boost their skills and unlock prizes and rewards at the same time. 

This innovative approach not only keeps everyone excited and involved but also encourages employees to truly own their learning journey. In turn, this gives you a sense of pride and accomplishment that goes beyond traditional training methods. It also empowers employees to shape their own learning journey, making their professional growth a truly exciting endeavor.

Gamification idea for training #4 - Storytelling and narrative games

Humans are naturally drawn to stories, and incorporating narrative elements into training can make them more compelling. Businesses can create immersive storylines that guide employees through their learning journey. Gamified training becomes more engaging, memorable, and relatable by introducing relatable characters and plot twists, as well as by using story plot generator to create personalized and interactive learning experiences.

Storytelling isn't just for bedtime tales. It can actually spice up your employee training. Imagine this – using stories to break down tricky stuff, like making sense of things with real-life examples. And you know what's even cooler? It can take trainees on a virtual adventure, kind of like a sneak peek into real-life scenarios.

Gamification idea for training #5 - Competency-based training

With this gamification idea, your team can say goodbye to boring memorization and hello to fun firsthand learning. Competency-based training is all about rolling up your sleeves and diving into real-life situations. Instead of just staring at books, your employees will be tackling hands-on activities and real challenges in the workplace. 

The way you can implement this is by giving your team members weekly challenges where they have to tackle a task to display a certain skill. And this can all be based on what they’ve learned so far.

This way, they're not just learning – they're gaining experience, and that's where the magic happens. By getting their hands dirty, they'll grasp concepts better and remember them for the long haul.

Gamification idea for training #6 - Virtual badges and rewards

Recognition plays a pivotal role in driving employee motivation. Nowadays, it's so easy to adopt traditional honors, like certificates and trophies, into the digital realm with the accessibility of virtual badges and rewards. These can easily be accessed and implemented through LMS gamification tools for training. 

These digital forms of recognition can serve as your team members’ visual representation of acquired skills, fostering personal pride and a culture of accomplishment. Such acknowledgments not only enrich their sense of self-worth but also stimulate a healthy competitive spirit, resulting in a workforce united by shared goals.

This combination of traditional recognition with gamification principles sets the stage for a workplace where accomplishments are consistently celebrated and motivation thrives.

EdApp is one gamification solution that gives you access to customizable reward tools like Achievements. With this innovative feature, you can personally congratulate, motivate, and inspire your learners with unique banners and badges. 

Plus, you have the option to export each learner's Achievements, so you can give a big shout-out to your top achievers and celebrate their milestones within your organization.

Gamification idea for training #7 - Time-management games

If you want to help your team level up their time-management skills, include time-based activities and games in your business gamification training. Through this process, they’ll be able to supercharge their productivity, solve problems under pressure, and make the most of their workday. 

There are a lot of ways you can go about this gamification idea. You can try offline games, where your teams can collaborate in the office and work together to tackle challenges quickly. Or, you can spice up their virtual training by adding online games into the mix. 

Online games can be your secret weapon for leveling up your team’s cognitive skills like focus, quick thinking, smart decision-making, and even sharp logic and critical thinking. And guess what? They're not just fun – they're also fantastic for mastering time management, staying organized, and honing those top-notch business skills.

Gamification idea for training #8 - Training progress bars

Progress bars are not just for aesthetics. They’re actually a great way to show your learners how much progress they've made toward completing a task. They also act like a visual guide that keeps your team members motivated and excited to continue learning. 

Imagine logging into your account and seeing your progress front and center. It's a friendly reminder of how far you've come and how much further you can go.

But you might be asking yourself, why are progress bars so effective? Well, they can give your learners a clear idea of how close they are to achieving their training goals. And here's the fun part: You can even pair progress bars with other gamification elements, like badges, which work as little rewards and celebrations for accomplishments at each stage of your employees’ progress.

Gamification idea for training #9 - Personalized learning paths

Personalized learning paths allow you to tailor and design training programs to fit your team’s unique needs, preferences, and learning styles. Instead of a one-size-fits-all approach, these pathways let your team members embark on a series of learning adventures that are customized just for them, helping them reach their goals in the most enjoyable and effective way.

Personalized learning can be like a mixtape of different learning experiences. You can combine e-learning courses, webinars, workshops, one-on-one coaching, and even on-the-job training to help diversify your team’s training. This way your team won’t get bored of their experience. 

Overall, it's a well-thought-out journey, where each step builds upon the last, guiding your employees toward specific learning outcomes and accelerating their growth.

Gamification idea for training #10 - Scavenger hunts

Who says learning has to be a solo adventure? Gamified training can be a team effort too. You can implement scavenger hunts that encourage your team to share ideas, solve problems, and basically work together to crack challenges and hit goals.

Scavenger hunts also allow your team members to use active learning and gamification techniques, which can actually boost their ability to remember and understand information. And when they do these activities with a group, something awesome happens: they not only learn together but also build a strong sense of teamwork and collaboration.

As trainers, you can make these activities even more exciting by using cool apps that bring in live locations or fun photo and video challenges. They'll add a touch of interaction and friendly competition and take your team’s learning adventures to a whole new level.