Gamification Mechanic Monday: Voting

Gamification Mechanic Monday: Voting

Voting is a well known gamification mechanic to get confirmation and feedback for a chosen solution. We see it applied in various business processes in politics when passing a bill, in shareholders meetings for decision and in operational meetings equally for decisions. It is used frequently in TV game shows where there are expert panels and winners have to be chosen. Voting can be shown with a hands up gesture to show your preference, the touch of a button  when done mechanically; star ratings and points can equally create a similar kind of feedback.

Voting gives people the choice typically between a few options and you then have rules whether you only have one vote or multiple, both can be used effectively. When you set the rule of having more than one vote, you may still limit the amount of times a person can vote on one item. Crowd voting is often used in shows such as Strictly Come Dancing or the X factor, to give the audience a sense of engagement and control in addition to the advice given by the expert jury.

When using voting, it is important to decide early on how much weighting each of the voting parties receives, the number of votes allowed and whether people are allowed to vote on themselves. If you are applying crowd voting it will be recommendable to give some guide on what you want people to vote on, explaining the criteria. You will still have some people that will vote without reading the criteria, but you have to trust that the majority will do the necessary. With crowd voting you do have the risk that popularity contests and in current times effective social media campaigning may rule the day, hence weighting as a consideration.

Where have you seen voting implemented well as part of a gamification project?

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