workplay: agile development as a game, and how to make it more so

Lean, Agile & Scrum Conference 2011

Sponsoren

Andreas Buzzi (Credit Suisse) | Erich Oswald (Ergon AG) François Bachmann (SPRiNT-iT Suisse) | Fredi Schmidli (swiss IT bridge gmbh) | Hans-Peter Korn (KORN AG) | Kai Windhausen (BSgroup Technology Innovation AG) | Mischa Ramseyer (pragmatic solutions gmbh) | Patrick Baumgartner (Swiftmind GmbH) | Peter Stevens (DasScrumTeam) | Reto Maduz (Zühlke AG) Tudor Girba

Organisationsteam

�Workplay: Agile development as a game, and how to make it more so�

Ma$ Philip 16:15

What if work life were more like a game?

About me

Pip (a.k.a. MaG Philip) Level-‐6 agile trainer-‐coach ThoughtWorks Studios guild

What this talk is about

Using games solely for training or planning

Games that teach

Experience report

Using games for actual work

Thinking about how we can gamify agile teams

How agile teams have a head start

Challenge!

Inspira?on and gra?tude

Key intersec?on

work

play

Personal and organiza?onal goals

Personal

Organizational

Why should we gamify work?

•  Adapt work for incoming, younger workforce •  Intrinsic rewards are renewable resource •  Develop leadership in teams •  More-‐sa?sfying work -‐> be$er produc?vity •  Develops people by poin?ng them forward •  Fosters teamwork and accountability •  Key to greater innova?on (through imagina?on)

Defining traits of a game

Concepts and terms

•  Play •  Flow •  Fiero •  Shared inten?onality •  Ping quo?ent (PQ) •  Collabora?on radar •  “Emergensight”

Csikszentmihalyi’s 9 features of flow

1.  Clear goals at every step 2.  Immediate feedback 3.  Balance between challenge and skill 4.  Merger of ac?on and awareness 5.  Exclusion of distrac?ons 6.  No worries about failure 7.  Absence of self-‐consciousness 8.  Time becomes distorted 9.  The experience is an end in itself

Intrinsic rewards

•  Sa?sfying work •  Experience (or at least the hope) of being successful

•  Social connec?on •  Meaning

How agile is already like a game

How agile is already like a game: Self-‐organizing teams

How agile is already like a game: “Quest-‐like” work

How agile is already like a game: Pairing and voluntary par?cipa?on

How agile is already like a game: Visible progress and rules

How agile is already like a game: High levels of communica?on

How agile is already like a game: Collabora?ng via whole-‐team approach

How agile is already like a game: Marketplace dynamics

How to make it more so

How to make it more so: Leveling up

as self-‐improvement

How to make it more so: Something bigger than ourselves

How to make it more so: Intensify feedback

How to gamify your agile team

Reeves and Reed’s 10 ingredients for great games

1.  Self-‐representa?on with avatars 2.  3D environments 3.  Narra?ve context 4.  Feedback 5.  Reputa?on, Ranks and Levels 6.  Marketplace and economics 7.  Compe??on under explicit, enforced rules 8.  Teams 9.  Parallel, reconfigurable communica?on systems 10. Time pressure

How to gamify your agile team: Some specifics

Example: Narra?ves and quests

Example: Avatars

Example: Customer wishes

Example: Project incep?on

– Team members create their characters, iden?fy what they’ll need (special training, hardware)

– “Dungeon master” (game designer/narrator) tells the team the back story

– Customer helps map out quests, gives virtual monetary value to each

– Designer and customer determine what it means to win, rules, virtual currency and rewards

Example: Team page

Possible roles in a gamified agile team

•  Game designer •  DKP (“dragon-‐kill points”) manager •  Guild leader

Dangers (Ach tung!)

Ac?vity: What might you do?

Ac?vity: Work-‐play mirror

gg (good game)

Ma$ Philip [email protected]

@ma$philip

workplay: agile development as a game, and how to make it more so

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