The first time I noticed left me stunned with disbelief. After it happened again, and a third time, I finally had to admit it: the little red Facebook notification icon had its hooks in me. Whether it’s a leisurely bedtime browse or a last-minute event page mishap, my hand is compelled to jump, unbidden, to click and clear the notification before allowing any further action to be taken. Even attempts to ignore it prove untenable – the red unblinking icon pierces my peripheral vision and nags until it’s clicked. With the psychological principles at play in the world of social networking, it’s no wonder that social mechanics have been applied to the world of business. Just clicking the notification icon is reinforced by simultaneously stroking the ego and relieving the “fear of missing out.” In addition to engagement, Facebook boasts instant communication, a space for collaboration, and the ability to plug in to the lifeblood of the community.
Behavior
Taking a look at the Fogg Behavior Model, from Dr. BF Fogg of Stanford University, explains why similar engagement doesn’t always transfer to the workplace. This model shows three elements, labeled Motivation, Ability, and Trigger, that must interact favorably for behavior to occur. For example, imagine the behavior of answering your cellphone. Without a ringtone, you wouldn’t be triggered to perform the action, no matter how able and motivated you are to answer. If your phone is locked in another room, you lack the ability to answer it regardless of how loudly it rings (trigger) and how motivated you are to answer. Lastly, it doesn’t matter if the phone is in your hand triggering you at full volume if you’re not motivated to talk to the caller.
Motivation
Looking at the shift from Facebook to an enterprise online community like Yammer through the lens of this model shows why the engagement found on Facebook will not translate to Yammer as smoothly. While it’s an easy and intuitive interface to use (ability), the motivation to engage is not the same. The intrinsic desire to scroll through endless posts exhibiting your friends’ lives and how many likes your #selfie attained is not quite matched by the desire to scroll through Yammer posts about team meetings and Alan’s daughter’s cookie sale.
Trigger
Think of all the reasons to go on Facebook and you’ll realize that most are prompted by an internal trigger. From uploading last night’s photos to something as simple as boredom or curiosity, these triggers all stem from the self and flow easily into the behavior of going on Facebook. When triggering the use of an online business community, it’s a different story. Oftentimes, employees are triggered to use Yammer or SharePoint by their managers or in an email, especially when the community is just getting started. It’s a long, uphill journey of adoption until employees begin to be internally triggered to use Yammer over email, for example.
Gamification
The true goal of gamification, contrary to popular belief, is not to add points, badges, and leaderboards to non-game areas. The goal is really to boost engagement through areas like motivation and competition. This may include using game mechanics like points or badges, but it may also involve social mechanics or reputation mechanics. Most good gamification solutions will be able to provide that extra motivational element lacking in enterprise online communities. Great gamification solutions will also trigger the user to continue performing behaviors. This could mean chaining behaviors together into mission tracks, guiding the user in a clear path of certain target behaviors, or merely calling the user to action after receiving a reward, “Congratulations on commenting 5 times for the Comment Badge! Comment 5 more times to receive the Master Comment Badge!” Real success resides in the ability to take these dynamics and finesse them to hit the particular KPIs important to the DNA of the online community. The Fogg Behavior Model can be taken and applied to a huge variety of software used today to reveal an expanse of software where careful thought and planning has made it intuitive to use but does not give users many other reasons to use it. Adding a layer of quality gamification can provide a sustained lift in engagement by motivating and triggering users.
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