A 2017 Gallup study revealed that a disengaged workforce is one of the largest hurdles to innovation and quick growth in the digital economy. Nearly 71% of American employees aren’t fully engaged at work, which costs $30 billion in lost productivity, annually. In much the same way, highly engaged workforces outperform their peers by 147% in earnings per share, show 25-65% less turnover and 37% less absenteeism. But as recent studies by Deloitte show, while 90 percent of executives understand the importance of employee engagement, fewer than 50 percent understand how to effectively address this issue.

Thankfully, quiz shows and gamification provide the missing piece of the jigsaw. By harnessing gamification’s attributes such as narrative, leaderboards, scores, quiz games, levels, rules, badges and skills, the employee value proposition can be communicated very effectively across departments, roles and geographies within the organization.

But why quiz shows and gamification?

According to the Brandon Hall Group, Employee Value Proposition or EVP may provide a competitive advantage by requiring the company to have:

• A formal process for capturing employee metrics
• Creative mechanisms for employee engagement activities
• Continuous analysis of data to identify gaps
• Growth and Development opportunities for performance improvement
• A sound communication strategy aligned with business goals

In order to make these lofty goals less abstract or intangible, HR departments must work overtime to translate them into specific initiatives. Quiz contests and gamification makes this easy for the organization and helps them to organize fun employee engagement activities

Real-world examples

• A major Indian multinational wanted an employee engagement technique to drive key values of the company. QuizWorks which was engaged for the project designed ‘Values Quiz’, a gamified quiz targeting 2000 employees across 8 cities. Associative Studies Methodology was implemented to transfer key learnings of the values module for better reinforcement. Subsequent surveys revealed that 92% of the participants rated the quiz as a better form of employee engagement and learning than traditional models.

View our success story by clicking here

• Accenture, one of the market leader in the Technology space has been a stalwart in employing gamification for fun employee engagement activities.

• Accenture Land: An online game that queries employees about training programs, social benefits, career development opportunities and CSR initiatives.
• Eco challenge: An annual global program that encourages employees to change their habits and hence reduce their environmental impact.

• Risk Management Solutions have turned an internal re-branding into a trading card game.

• Deloitte created a ‘Deloitte China Virtual Tour campaign; where Deloitte’s offices in Beijing, Hong Kong, and Shanghai were virtually mapped. This helps job-seekers explore every department and get a firsthand look at working in China.

Conclusion

Research and strategic analysis firm Mind Commerce expects the market for gamification will cross $10 billion in 2020. This is not surprising considering that a significant part of the workforce by then will comprise millennials. And as research by Brandon Hall Group shows, top-performing employees want to understand a company’s mission, values, successes, and losses as much as any executive does. However, in today’s digital economy, time and attention are scarce and resources precious, so employees are likely to explore activities that are more fun, rewarding and offer opportunities to achieve, grow and socialize. Goals that quiz shows and gamification precisely achieves with ease!

If you are looking at creating similar employment engagement activities at your company, please reach us at daksha.ballal@quizworks.in

This board game originated from India and was called “mokshapatamu”. The object of the game is to navigate one’s game piece, to evade vices and follow virtue, ultimately leading to nirvana. Identify this game.

Kakori, Shami, and Döner are some of the varieties of a popular food that originated in Persia, now found worldwide. Which food item?

These were some of the questions that were asked at Mastermind 2018 – a quiz contest organised by QuizWorks, India’s leading quiz company, for the Indian expats and their families in Bahrain. The quiz show consisted of 400 people who are Persons of Indian origin but settled in Bahrain and working for large organisations there. There was a need to host a quiz night for community engagement of family audience where the entire family including children took part in the contest. Out of 150 people who took the prelims, 18 people or Top 6 teams made it to the finals of the quiz competition.

Held at the beautiful Crowne Plaza Hotels, the finals consisted of 5 Rounds covering diverse topics from Sports, Current Affairs, History, Business, Technology etc.  Raj Dam, founder of QuizWorks, was the quizmaster for the evening.  The questions and host’s presentation style kept the audience engaged for over 2 hours. At the end, Top 3 winners were given prizes while audience received a lot of prizes for answering audience questions.

Here is a testimonial from the Chairperson of Bahrain Chapter of ICAI:

“It was a wonderful Quiz, we had in Bahrain, conducted for the first time for the CA Members in the entire Middle east countries. Initially members were bit hesitant. As the Quiz date was nearing, we got 30 teams of 3 members each for the preliminary round. From there 6 teams were chosen for the Finale. The finale was attended by more than 200 members and their families. All the attendees praised the Quiz Master Mr. Raj for the thoughtful questions and the way he conducted the Quiz. Definitely there was lot to learn from the quiz but there was lots of entertainment for all. To conclude, I should say, it was a wonderful Quiz show, very able Quiz master and thoroughly enjoyed by all the attendees. Definitely, we are going to have more shows in the near future.”

If you are interested in conducting a quiz competition for any of your employee engagement activities/ corporate events/customer engagement activities, please reach us at daksha.ballal@quizworks.in.

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India celebrates 50th Engineer’s Day on September 15th to mark the birth anniversary of Sir M Visvesvaraya, the most outstanding Indian Engineer. He was the brain behind Hyderabad’s flood protection system and the construction of Krishna Raja Sagara dam in Mysore. The 6^th Edition of Times Ascent Engineering Mastermind Quiz, India’s biggest Inter-Corporate Quiz for engineers, will be held on 15th, 16th and 17th September 2017. It will be a battle among the top engineering minds in the country.

Our top quizmasters – Runal Dahiwade, Raj Dam and Miraj Vora – will engage the audience with their expertise and wit across Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi, Chennai, Pune, Hyderabad & Ahmedabad after which the top zonal teams will battle for the grand finals in Chennai on 17^th September.

To know more about this event click HERE

Interrogante is the annual quiz event conducted by Christ University, Bangalore. This event has grown to become one of the must-attend events for a quizzer in their quizzing calendar. Ably hosted by MINDCOGS,  the quiz started off with a written Prelims. The 8 teams who qualified for the next round were:

1. Sai Mitra/TCS
2. ESPN Cricinfo/Capgemini
3. Genesis Colors/Mahindra
4. Christ University
5. Suguna Holdings/VIT Vellore
6. Ujjivan/Nexus Consulting
7. 3one4 Capital/Amazon
8. Walnut Knowledge Solutions

Sai Mitra/TCS won the event with a score of 155 followed by Ujjivan/Nexus Consulting who came second with a score of 85, Suguna Holdings/VIT Vellore came third with a score of 65, ESPN Cricinfo/Capgemini came fourth with a score of 55, 3one4 Capital/Amazon and Walnut Knowledge Solutions had a tie for the fifth position with a score of 50, Genesis Colors/Mahindra was in the sixth position with a score of 20 and Christ University secured the 7^th position with a score of 05 points.

The questions ranged from all fields some of which are given below:

FIRST ROUND:

1. Identify the person who passed away in November, 2016 in Bengaluru. He was the managing director of a company which originally started with Silk Manufacture in 1906 and then diversified to the field they were most famous for.

Ans.:  L. Srihari Khoday

2. Pecten Maximus, is a northeast Atlantic species of scallop, an edible saltwater clam, in the family Pectinidae. Pacten maximus is quite robust and is characterized by having ears of equal size on either side of the apex. The right, or lower, valve is convex and slightly overlaps the flat left, or upper valve, which is flat. In business, what is derived from this?

Ans.: The Royal Dutch Shell Logo

3. The term for this hedge fund is a metaphor which is used to denote the behavior of preying on debtors in financial distress by purchasing the now cheap credit on a secondary market to make a large monetary in many cases leaving the debtor in a worse state?

Ans.: Vulture Fund

4. It came into existence in the 13^th century. It is believed to have been first made by the Saudagar family. Previously known as Kapashi, Paytaan, Kachkadi, Bakkalnali and Pukari, the name indicated the area where they were made. What is this?

Ans.: Kolhapuri Chappal.

5. On asked about this acquisition in 2016, Iceland based CEO Thor F, said, “I hope that Glu will take good care of my baby”. What was his baby?

Ans.: QuizUp

6. Which company’s logo is inspired from the fountain of the Neptune in Bologna, Italy and it comes from the French word for ‘three’ ‘teeth’?

Ans.: Maserati

7. Her journey started when she flunked her first year exams in the textile Designing course at the Sophia Polytechnic in Mumbai in 1983. She enrolled for a screen printing and textile designing workshop. Finally in 1985 she borrowed Rs. 7000 from her mother and set off for Crawford Market, where she bought some fabric, rope and other raw material. Her first employees were the building liftman and security guard. Which hugely popular brand for women she created?

Ans.: Baggit

8. It was founded in 1958 by Surya                                                                                                                                                  One night Wonowidjojo had a dream in which the old salt warehouse which stood across the way from another factory Cap 93, featured prominently. Subsequently, Sarman, one of the original fifty employees who had followed him when he left Cap 93, advised him to put a picture of the warehouse on every packet to secure good fortune. Wonowidjojo thought this was a good idea and asked Sarman to design the logo.What am I talking about?

Ans.: Gudang Garam

9. This was originally placed on police chiefs in cities of Madras, Bombay, Calcutta, Lahore and Rangoon in Burma in 1920s. Regional heads were independent. After independence, the autonomy of regional heads was abolished and they were brought under the Bombay Board. Finally after passing of a particular Act in 1952, the entire structure was unified and reconstituted. What am I talking about?

Ans.: CBFC- Central Board of Film Certification

10. A Bengaluru based startup called Safe Halo has made a new product for just INR 600/- which has created a huge buzz in the market. In a span of 3 months, they have received more than 50000 orders. Their highest orders are coming in from Kota, Rajasthan. What product have they created which is 2.5 inch x 2.5 inch device made of metal and plastic, comprising an alarm.

Ans.: An anti-suicide ceiling fan.

QuizWorks has won the prestigious Tech Rocketship Awards 2016 for Outsell –  A Sales effectiveness software. Outsell helps sales reps be more productive through in-field coaching and providing byte size engaging content on products/services – all delivered within a proprietary SAAS technology on web and mobile.

QuizWorks has been a pioneer in making enterprise content engaging through quizzification, micro-learning and gamification over the years and has engaged 1 Million + individuals across 80 cities in India. With Outsell, it disrupted the sales training industry by taking training beyond classrooms, providing continuous training reinforcements and assessments for better recall. Outsell also ensured that access to sales content like product literature, case studies, process information etc are now standardized and provided to sales reps at the moment of truth i.e during customer meetings.

Accepting the award, Miraj Vora, Co-Founder – Outsell, said, “It is an inspiration and honor to receive this award. As a sales effectiveness company, we believe we are helping sales reps be better at their jobs, which in turn creates financial success for them and better buying experiences for the customer”

QuizWorks won the award after a two-stage evaluation process and among 700 odd entries. The jury consisted of eminent leaders from industry like Mr. Anand Mahindra, Mr. Ajai Chowdhry, Mr. Sanjeev Bikhchandani, Dr. Saurabh Srivastav, Ms. Shardha Sharma, Dr. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, Mr. Alpesh Patel and Mr. John Kat. The award was presented by Mr. Mohan Das Pai of Aarin Capital.

For more information about Outsell , visit www.letsoutsell.com or email miraj.vora@letsoutsell.com.

“Will you fit into our organization?” an innocuous question that the world’s largest professional services firm asked its potential recruits last year – just that it did not ask this question face to face, but in the form of an interactive gamified recruitment video. This video chronicles the journey (A-Day-In-Life) of a young new hire and gives him scenarios that he has to choose, which are commensurate with the company’s corporate values. The correct answer is then highlighted. It’s a great way of turning boring recruitment videos into an interesting format, engaging young recruits, and educating them on the behavior that the organization expects from its employees; thus enabling a potential recruit to figure out if he/she is the right fit for the company.

The gamification trend is fast catching up and leading global brands are using gamification tools and techniques to attract and hire talent. They have to – Forbes estimates that by the year 2025, 75% of the global workforce would be millennials, and just this fact would fundamentally challenge how we recruit, induct, and engage with prospective employees. And therefore traditional recruitment systems and techniques of the last century don’t hold good anymore.

Recruitainment is Recruitment V2.0

A leading global diversified hospitality company asks potential recruits to go through real life scenarios through a “Virtual Kitchen”. A potential ‘candidate’ or a ‘player’ walks through the virtual kitchen and deals with scenarios such as handling an irate customer, ordering groceries, and managing the kitchen. The company then analyzes the data of the players, figures out the guys who can handle stress and deliver orders on time, and calls them for the next round, eliminating interview costs and saving time and money on hiring a wrong candidate.

Employer branding is commonly defined as “an image a company projects as a potential employer to a desired target audience”. A closer look will throw out three keywords:

Perception/Image
Projection/Promotion and
Target Group/Audience

Now, a brand fundamentally has a unique position in a customer’s mind. The perception therefore needs to be ideated by the company, but once it does that, quizzing and gamification comes extremely handy in delivering (projection/promotion) the message to a given target audience.

A leading Indian multinational automobile manufacturing corporation has done this beautifully. In the last decade or so, the manufacturing sector has lost considerable talent to the IT/ITES sector, primarily because of the huge appetite of IT firms for recruiting engineering graduates irrespective of their branch/specialization. The automobile giant wanted to fix this. They realized that instilling “auto passion” in young minds and showcasing the company’s heritage and current work would result in the organization taking a “preferred employer” position among e-school and b-school students. Thus was born a gamified quiz for e-school and b-school students (currently also open to working executives). Today this project reaches out to more than 60 locations across the country, has received multiple awards, and is one of the most recalled campus events in the country. Some of the game elements that are used in this include competition, collaboration, challenge, status, progression, instant feedback, achievements, rewards, points, etc.

Gamification enables employer branding specialists to engage deeper with prospective employees, as gamification helps dig into the intrinsic motivation of any candidate/player and engage him/her meaningfully with the company’s core messaging. This is a technique that is set for exponential growth globally in the recruitment and employer branding space.

A leading American multinational conglomerate, which uses science and innovation in their day to day operations, values the importance of sustaining the culture of innovation in their workplace and community. While their employees are imbibed with such values from Day 1, there was a need to engage their community of buyers and articulate the theme of innovation.

Designed as a feature of the Workshop which the company imparts, an Innovation Quiz was created and hosted by QuizWorks. Content was based around Innovation in Technology, Movies, Companies, Day to Day Life and other areas. The audience profile was VP’s and Senior Managers of Supply Chain Management, Delivery and Design at leading Indian companies.

This initiative was done as a fun exercise to engage the audience. Questions were in the form of Text, Visuals and Audio Videos.

Have a look at the questions asked:-

Q1. Made famous by MS Dhoni, it is a wristy whip shot, but uses a lot more bottom hand and has more pronounced bat swing. The quick rotation of the blade in the follow through of the shot also explains the name associated with the shot.  What are we talking about?

Q2. According to popular lore, this dish originated in 1683 as a celebration of Austrian victory over the Ottomans at the siege of Vienna.  The story follows that a baker saved the city when he heard the Turks tunneling underneath the city and sounded an alarm.  The dish’s curved shape is said to mimic the crescent moon of the Ottoman flag. Which pastry item are we talking about?

If you want to engage your employees or your community through an innovation quiz, feel free to reach us here. Meanwhile, check out our Ideafest case study centered on Innovation.

In the space of 5 years, Times Ascent Engineering Mastermind has grown from a 3 city event to a 7 city event. Having marquee sponsors such as Ultratech, Honeywell and Murugappa Group over the last 5 editions, QuizWorks is proud to have successfully hosted each and every edition. Attracting and engaging over 800 teams, spanning different engineering backgrounds, is what makes this property one of India’s biggest brand properties. Here’s looking forward to more editions.