The Game Dame™

A new study by IBM and Seriosity proves that online role playing games are shaping the next generation of corporate leaders, revealing similar qualities between white-collared business executives and those who play massive multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG).

“What we’ve found is that success as a business leader may depend on skills as a gamer,” said Jim Spohrer, Director of Services Research, IBM Research Center in Almaden, Calif. “Smart organizations are recognizing valued employees who play online games and apply their skills and experiences as virtual leaders to their ‘real world’ jobs.”

The study shows that there are significant parallels between online gaming and the future of the workplace. Today’s gamers learn collaboration, self-organization, risk taking, openness, influence, how to earn incentives linked to performance and how be flexible in the way they communicate.

One of the most important features observed in this study was how online environments allow leaders and managers, as well as anyone with good ideas, to collaborate in organizations that are distributed, global, hyper-competitive and virtual. IBM and Seriosity wanted to find a way to bring this successful model to the business world.

Their first step towards applying gamer logic to business is called Attent^TM and is designed to help 9-5ers deal with flooded email inboxes. Using Serios^TM, a virtual currency in the Attent ecosystem, users assign values to the email messages they send based on importance. So the email sent out about the leftover birthday cake might get 0 Serios, but the email about the client review being moved up a week might get 50. Email recipients can sort their messages by value to easily answer the important ones first.

Attent also provides a variety of tools that enable everyone to track and analyze communication patterns and information exchanges across the enterprise. For instance, you’ll be able to see if your manager only opens emails with a Serios value of 15 or more, and then you’ll know how to assign value the messages you’re sending.

“This research has validated Seriosity’s solutions for creating a platform to transform the business world. The research proves that online games have valuable lessons for success in business,” says Ken Ross, CEO of Seriosity, “Seriosity’s solutions provide the physical link to bridge the virtual and business worlds.”

To find out more about Attent and future plans for Seriosity and IBM, click here.