Why Work Is Looking More Like a Video Game

james_bong666 writes "According to the New York Times, business software vendors can learn a great deal from how video games are designed. This makes a lot of sense — how many professionals like working with their software in the office as much as gaming after hours? Developers can deal with looking at tables and grids full of data to make decisions and get things done, but other types of workers (executives, salespeople, etc.) have little to no attention span and need a picture to be worth a thousand words, i.e. their software designed completely differently."

work / play

Actually videogames are becoming more like work than being a diversion where a person can blow off steam. Have you played GTA: San Andreas? All those mini button pushing games just to get the character up to snuff to complete a quest. Don't get me started on Harvest Moon. Pokemon with its breeding, hatching eggs, growing berries and other nonsense. Games don't reward the player for their skill or talent at completing a level or pulling off a stunt. Nowadays games simply add hours to their playtime by adding hours and hours of pointless grinding to unlock something really stupid.
By the way, I don't care how much someone loves their job. Anyone who stays after-hours and plays games or just hangs out is sad.

Re:work / play

Anyone who stays after-hours and plays games or just hangs out is sad.

It's not the job, it's the coworkers. Work is one of the few places I can meet computer geeks IRL.

Uh.

Actually it's not the interface that makes the game fun... There are some games that have great interfaces - that I personally do not find fun to play (CIV, WoW), etc. I also disagree with this statment: "other types of workers (executives, salespeople, etc.) have little to no attention span and need a picture to be worth a thousand words" I fail to see how employment position is a realisic and valid way to determine attention span.

Re:Uh.

I believe that executives (especially those that have worked their way to the top) would not have a very short attention span. To the contrary, they can see the big picture and work their way towards their ultimate goal. However, I also believe that people who work would be much more productive if they felt they got some form of enjoyment out of what they're doing. Isn't that why Ben Franklin (I think) said something along the lines of 'The day you get a job that you really like is the day you get your last paycheck'?

Re:Uh.

I agree. The blanket claim that only developers have long attention spans is ridiculous and insulting. I can't believe that the Slashdot article made this claim.

Scientists, small business owners, executives, and even the person tending the grill at the burger joint have normal attention spans.

Do not underestimate the difficulty and attention required of other people's work. I am now a lab manager of a memory development lab at a major university, but I've spent many years working at mini-markets, coffee shops, etc.

Let me tell you. If you have 14 fraps, 5 iced lattes, 3 vanilla lattes, 4 hot mochas, and several ice teas to make in under 6 minutes, all the while greeting customers and making small talk, you damn well better pay attention, and concentrate.

In such cases, you transcend the planning of one or two drinks, and start planning and attending to the situation at a larger scale. At that level, its Zen.

Re:Uh.

Exactly. Here's a hint to computer programmers: If the user's not getting what they need from your application, then you fucked up. It's your job to make your software usable. Stop blaming others for problems caused by your shitty UI design skills. Good Christ, I'm sick of the condescension I see coming every day from my fellow developers.

Re:Uh.

Perhaps we need to stop requiring developers to design user interfaces and have UI specialists write that part of the code?

Developers write fantastic User Interfaces. Also see Unix. Not quite what you mean? Find a specialist who specialises in UIs for non developers.

Naked Objects

The guys at Naked Objects (http://www.nakedobjects.org/ [nakedobjects.org]) have been singing a similar tune for some time now. Not the part about making business more like games, but about using "open-ended" and proper object oriented software that allows user interaction similar to games. I think they even used The Incredible Machine as inspiration.

You'd get even greater compliance...

Reasoning that sales people are wildly competitive, he thought that they would respond to a program that showed where they stood against their goals -- or their peers'. Hence, Rave, which Entellium introduced in April.

You could get even greater compliance if you showed their competitors getting blown up when an individual's sales figures are better than their co-workers. I mean, if you're going to make it like video game, go all the way!

Next ad in, when your boss pisses you off, his likeness appears in a first person shooting game - as the "monster".

Jaded MMORPGer

You mean

"Gaming is more like work nowadays"

?

Non-programmers can't do without pictures?

but other types of workers (executives, salespeople, etc.) have little to no attention span and need a picture to be worth a thousand words

I'm as prejudiced against non-programmers/techies as the next person, but that just jumped at me immediately as pretty damn condescending.

Re:Non-programmers can't do without pictures?

One thing that was drilled into us in an Engineering Communications class was to assume your audience (often management) was impatient, had limited reading comprehension, and generally ignorant of your subject matter. At the time we thought this was amusing, as we imagined the standard Dilbert stereotype of a manager.

Looking back now, I see this was more of a mental exercise than a statement about our future bosses' intellectual abilities. Engineers tend to be detail-oriented, especially about their particular work. This is generally good, because details matter in implementation, but bad for communication if it clutters up the main points you are trying to convey. By telling engineers to write like their audience is stupid and lazy, you might end up with something that is almost understandable. :)

In reality, your boss might not be an expert in the field, and they also have lots of information flying at them from all directions. Making prose simple and compact speeds comprehension for busy people. Unfortunately, people who are predisposed to have a negative attitude toward management (bad previous managers, overly large nerd egos, social insecurity, etc) just remember this advice as "Write simply because my boss is dumb."

Patronising BS

Developers can deal with looking at tables and grids full of data to make decisions and get things done, but other types of workers (executives, salespeople, etc.) have little to no attention span and need a picture to be worth a thousand words, i.e. their software designed completely differently.

The attention span of executives, salespeople, etc. is perfectly in fine. What they have in most cases is badly designed software often due to the 'attentive' developers who failed to gather or understand the correct requirements and then delivered a poor and inflexible implementation of this misunderstanding which does not deliver the information they really require.

These people don't need their software designed completely differently, they just need it designed better.

Re:Patronising BS

It isn't just that it's condescending to say that sales and management people have no attention span... it's rather disengenuous, actually. In fact, I've worked with plenty of IT people who can't keep their employer's business objectives (you know, the things that actually allow the paychecks to be cashed?) in mind for more than one minute after they leave a meeting or delete an e-mail. Sales people stay focused on what they need to stay focused on (usually, cultivating a relationship with the person who has money to spend). That can take YEARS to cement. And one IT guy who's more interested in finding a machine to burn down so he can install some new distro than he is in making sure that the sales guy's CRM database doesn't puke while he's on the road and needs it the most... that can kill the cash cow that allows IT to exist at all. Basically: snotty IT types that describe all sales/management people in such patronizing terms are just illustrating exactly why sales/management types so often roll their eyes whenever they have to deal with IT.

missing the point

I think TFA is missing the point. After reading it, I came away with "If we make work less like work and more like fun, then it will be fun." However, fun does not equal associating pictures, likes/dislikes, favorite colors etc with a business contact. I think the point is that if your job requires you to use a CRM system, then it is not fun by definition, and no amount of reskinning that interface is going to make it more enjoyable.

I agree that the ideas of connection, management and cooperation within MMORPG are potentially interesting in the context of managing large companies, but the "making work like a videogame" metaphor doesn't work for me.

yskel

And all this time...

...I thought it was because of the genetically engineered monster roaming the cubicles. Otherwise known as "Diane from Accounting".

Please Sir,

I want a game where I can enter profits on my spread sheet with an interface that involves shooting fish in a barrel!

Or may be a first person shooter with the TAX man as a way of handling sales taxes.

Good friggin' grief!

Is there no limit to the shallowness and stupidity of the younger generation?

It's always been like a video game. Says BOFH.

From here [ntk.net]:

Another user rings "I said what I wanted was more space on my account, *please*"

"Sure, hang on"

I hear him gasp his relief even though he'd covered the mouthpeice.

"There, you've got *plenty* of space now!"

"How much have I got?" he simps

"Well, let's see, you have 4 Meg available"

"Wow! Eight Meg in total, thanks!" he says, pleased with his bargaining power

"No" I interrupt, savouring this like a fine red at room temperature, with steak, extra rare, to follow; "4 Meg in total.."

"Huh? I'd used 4 Meg already, How could I have 4 Meg Available?"

I say nothing. It'll come to him.

"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaggggggh hhhhH!"

The Next Level

Does this mean that in order to advance to "the next level," you have to kill the Big Boss at the end of the current level?

Re:The Next Level

No, in this game, the big boss kills you - through all the soul-leaching, mindless, bureaucratic, pointless nonsense that comes rolling down from the top. Once you've submitted (or have been properly assimilated) you can move to the next level.

Obvious, but overlooked

This has parallels with what I am learning in medical school (yes, a med student who reads slashdot *gasp*). We are taught that we cannot use medical jargon to explain things to patients, because our level of training and experience is completely different from that of the average patient. This is also true in software, but I don't think developers are taught this point. This often results in the user not understanding what may have been obvious to the software designer, and a program that is not popular with the public. In both fields, I feel one must think at the level of the end user. In medicine, it is to provide the best health outcome by promoting understanding. We do this because we recognize that not everyone is health literate. In software, I think to be successful, it is also important to recognize that not everyone is tech literate, and design products accordingly.

Interesting.

I can definitely see this sort of thing happening in my line of work; I'm a mechanical engineer who specializes in design. I'll spend the bulk of my work week playing with 3D models, and the finite element model [wikipedia.org] does all the work I hated having to do by hand. The people who use my work give ratings for how much they like the final product, so I like to think of (that rating)/(total cost) as my "score".

Be afraid...

When your workplace starts looking more like a video game (for example, Doom 1/2/3) you need to start seeking help before it is too late....

It's called "Gamer Influenced Design"

The reason why this is happening is because most business software designed by engineers for engineers ends up being shelfware. One of the main ideas behind modern Business Intelligence software is that the most sophisticated pattern recognition engine lies between our ears. Give the user a well designed visualization of their data and they'll see the pattern. Give them grids and tables and they'll shrug.

Etrade does this

ETrade's user trading interface was deliberately designed to look something like a video game. Not too many choices, self-guiding, big type. This encourages users to trade too much.

Real life

plays like a video game, now. It's all about maximizing your benefits while balancing your time expenditures. I, uhh... guess intentionally taking damage in a a speed run would be akin to taking a late fee on your car payment in order to make the rent payment. Boring stuff, eh?

Why Work Is Looking More Like a Video Game ?

or is the other way around ?

If work was like the games I play...

Richard Chesler: [Reading a piece of paper] The first rule of Fight Club is you don't talk about Fight Club?

Narrator: [Voice-over] I'm half asleep again; I must've left the original in the copy machine.

Richard Chesler: The second rule of Fight Club - is this yours?

Narrator: Huh?

Richard Chesler: Pretend you're me, make a managerial decision: you find this, what would you do?

Narrator: [pauses] Well, I gotta tell you: I'd be very, very careful who you talk to about that, because the person who wrote that... is dangerous.

[Gets up from the chair]

Narrator: [Talking slowly] And this button-down, Oxford-cloth psycho might just snap, and then stalk from office to office with an Armalite AR-10 carbine gas-powered semi-automatic weapon, pumping round after round into colleagues and co-workers. This might be someone you've known for years. Someone very, very close to you.

Narrator: [Voice-over] Tyler's words coming out of my mouth.

[Snatches the piece of paper from boss' hands]

Narrator: [Voice-over] And I used to be such a nice guy.

Narrator: Or maybe you shouldn't bring me every little piece of trash you happen to pick up.

[Phone rings]

Narrator: [Into phone] Compliance and Liability...?

Marla Singer: My tit's gonna rot off.

Narrator: [to boss] Would you excuse me? I need to take this.

My word processor as Pacman

I've always wanted a word processor where backspace and delete would show Packman eating away the letters.

Bert

I'll go one further

No doubt, looking at game UIs or other UIs offers invaluable input. Yet, I would argue that it's more valuable to adopt the design and development process that the game industry has in place.

There is a reason why contemporary games often have fairly progressive and intuitive user interface solutions. As most game designer have realized, you need to have the visual communication folks on-board at the start, and they need to have input in to the design of communication tools. More often then not, desktop applications are designed by a software engineer and skinned by a graphic designer. This is fairly miserable approach.

A bit of a forced analogy, but a good point.

I don't think it's a matter of work imitating games, I think it's that application developers are now going down the same usability design paths that games require. Most people aren't required to play games, so the successful ones are the engaging ones, the games that give you a clear idea of what you need to do, and clearly present the required information. People like overcoming challenges when they think they see the way to do it. At work people are often dealing with scenarios where they would like to do a good job, but may not have the information on what is required, or they are dealing with too many factors to filter the wheat from chaff. They may lose focus because they have forgotten what their goals are. Most of management training revolves around how to present information to people, which provides the feedback loop people need to do their jobs. The idea that this is starting to show up in applications is an interesting, but natural step.

gaming/work fun

"how many professionals like working with their software in the office as much as gaming after hours?"

Work hasn't been all that fun lately, but most modern games I encounter are still less fun.

Work and home aren't the same

This makes a lot of sense -- how many professionals like working with their software in the office as much as gaming after hours?

I like sitting in my recliner at home a lot more than in my office chair at work, but it doesn't mean there's anything wrong with the work chair. Different missions (pleasure vs productivity) yield different levels of enjoyment.

Funny...

I thought work was like a Dilbert [dilbert.com] cartoon. Actually, when I worked in the video game industry for six years, management at one company did banned Dilbert cartons from cubicle walls since the similarities were amazingly relevent.

A videogame, sure, but this is not a good thing.

I actually made the comparison between a video game and my work just a few days ago, though not in the manner being discussed in the above article. Here is an example:

I was tasked with setting up the Outlook profiles of 3 new users in the accounting office. This should be a very straight-forward, brain-dead job. To complete this, however, involved me eventually having to replace a machine in the office, which meant a trip across campus to the purchasing office in order to locate a spare box. The purchasing guy wouldn't give up his spare box willingly unless I performed another task he needed accomplished and which had been far lower on IT's priority list. To complete THAT task, I had to drive to another location, speak to yet another person, fix yet another problem, and finally wind up back where I started.

Had someone asked me to climb a magic mountain to retrieve an ancient artifact in order to unlock some secret spell would have made as much sense.

On the flipside, I gained +750 EP, +200 gold, and rose 2 levels. ;)

Games recommeded for executives and salespeople

VR golf

From the game designer's perspective

I'm an up-and-coming game designer who has spent a lot of his time researching fundamental game mechanics and play concepts. A lot of what's coming out of the slashdotted article is that the program is being redesigned to make more sense to the user. Business productivity and sales software was never meant to be "exciting" or "flashy", it was just designed to get the job done.

The reason why video games such as Second Life, World of Warcraft, and even RTS games such as SimCity, Civilization, and Age of Empires are so successful is that they present their data in a way that makes sense to the Player. The data is shown in a way that the Player can easily interpret in terms of His/Her progression, and it is this simplication of statistics the game's software provides that removes a lot of the number-crunching and interpretation that is usually involved in the real-life equivalent the game simulates (being mayor of a city, for instance). Thanks to this the Player spends less time interpreting data and more time thinking about how to resolve conflicts or improve performance. In terms of software design, more is being done under the hood to better address the connection between abstract data and the user's goals. Like the article points out, the kinds of organizations found in MMORPGs such as World of Warcraft and Second Life are so prevalent and successful thanks to the design of each games' respective interface. Guilds succeed because the game was designed to handle them.

I don't think that salespeople have "short attention spans" like the article claims, I just believe that there is a larger gap between the Users' goals and the software that sustains them. Programmers these days have it easy with high-level languages such as C++, but if we all went back to the age where we had to program in machine code or assembly language we would be dealing with similar issues.

MS-Bob lives!

...Now we can again have a dog light the house on fire.

The Bridge on the Starship "Enterprise"

I've been saying since 1978, that a modern business should resemble the bridge on the Starship "Enterprise". It is not the "interface" that's missing so much as the "feedback". A business has a cycle: The process of making contact with a prospect, getting an order, fulfilling the order and getting paid may actually happen pretty quickly in some instances, but it is not instantaneous. MIS can only do three things; measure compliance with the business objectives (like accounting), schedule the elements of the process, or play "what if" to make the process more efficient and profitable. Any other computers engaged in the company are probably there for "production" of some sort, helping the cycle become fulfilled. The people in the company take action to complete the cycle, but many times they don't know if they are on track and what the effect of their action is, or even if it contributes to the fulfillment of the product or service. A game/reporting interface should give nearly immediate feedback on the result of the action. This is what happens in a game. Furthermore, the system should be adaptive. The interface should adapt, the feedback should adapt, and the result should be better actions on the part of the participants.

On the "what if" side, I am reminded that the Atomic Energy Commission used the Atari game "Meltdown" to teach the basics of running a nuclear reactor through simulation. Each business "system" ought to have a simulator to enhance the process for the customers, the employees and the business.

Sounds like my work

I see where they're coming from - my work resembles World of Warcraft. I'm a Level 2 Helpdesk Officer, work with trolls and orcs, don't have nearly enough gold, and have to grind for ages (often repeating the same missions multiple times) to get enough experience to level up.

Indeed.

Especially from this [3drealms.com] game.

Naked breasts

I spend most of my spare time at home watching porn. Does that mean work should be more like porn?

But I'm a Systems Administrator

I already can make work look like a videogame... Just look at my interface to kill processes [sourceforge.net] :-D

Multi-touch Interface business apps

Multi-touch interface has already regained some strength for making apps more intuitive to use, in part thanks to recent efforts of Jeff Han [wikipedia.org]. He garnered much interest through a demonstration [youtube.com] at TED 2006. See what he's up to today [wired.com] with his new company.

REAL "Life" Work.....

For me, work is more like a cartoon.....Dilbert, to be precise.

empty calories

Not everyone is addicted to games. Games pit your wit & skill against some artificial creation and reward you with points or cute sounds, etc ... a pat on the back for your effort from some anonymous programmer. Empty calories.

Business software can reward you with spending cash, a feeling of accomplishment and the respect of worthy associates. Whatever economic goals and ideas you have, this software can amplify your ability to realize them. Quality nutrition!

Perhaps there is a perceptual disconnect in some people between the work they do and the money they have in the bank. These people might slack off at work or at home without realizing that there are consequences for themselves and others. Enthusiasm for work will not be generated by more amusing software interfaces. It comes from an internal reward system that is triggered by a worthwhile job well done.

I'm self-employed and am challenged by real needs for research, production, distribution, marketing, and the tiresome need to verify large bank deposits, etc.

When I work in Excel to plot a more efficient formula for a product, or work in Word or Dreamweaver to improve a marketing message, or simply browse the net to spy on competing products/services, I'm in heaven. Except perhaps when web sites present cute animated graphics, noises and 'innovative' navigation systems.

I'm not a workaholic; I'd rather be at the beach. I simply want the biggest reward for the least effort, and that depends upon reliable business software; software that doesn't intrude. I'm very happy with what's available and don't believe that the minds that waste precious hours programming otherworld frivolity will be able to improve my business software.

Blame it on the UI?

This bit caught my eye:

but other types of workers (executives, salespeople, etc.) have little to no attention span and need a picture to be worth a thousand words

This is true for everyone up to a point. But it might be exposing the weaknesses in the sorts of people who go into executive/sales positions rather than the UI. Those who can absorb data in the 'denser' form of charts and tables will naturally have an advantage over those who can't. Those who can't will migrate to careers where this ability is less important. Unfortunately, as technology progresses, more and more of this 'dense' data will become a part of all jobs. The executive of yesteryear may only have needed a good golf game, but with Sarbanes-Oxley, they actually need to understand what they are signing.

The moral of the story is: When you're in school, lay off the bong and the keg and study. The only jobs left with a really user-friendly UI are the POS terminals with pictures of burgers and French fries on the buttons.

Software Testing

Just like game companies, we won't have to worry about it!

Accessibility for the intellectually disabled

"Developers can deal with looking at tables and grids full of data to make decisions and get things done, but other types of workers (executives, salespeople, etc.) have little to no attention span and need a picture to be worth a thousand words, i.e. their software designed completely differently."

This sounds like it is referring to the need for a new type of accessibility software -- accessibility software for the intellectually disabled (i.e. executives, salespeople, project managers, etc.).

Sorry for the rather mean sarcasm, but lately my entire job has become devoted to having to produce output that has been pre-digested for the consumption of supposedly intelligent professionals who are somehow unable to look at a table with more than two rows and three columns without throwing up their hands in frustration.