Editor’s Note: This is the final story in a five-part series published as part of Innovation Week, a collaboration between CUToday.info and the Filene Research Institute, featuring five innovative i3 projects. For details, see article at right.
BOULDER, Colo.—Approximately seven-out-of-ten employees in the U.S. are disengaged from their workplaces, leading to hundreds of billions of dollars in lost productivity. This can be especially true on the front lines, one of the most critical points of member contact and also home to many of the newest and youngest employees.
A team from Filene’s i3 program has attempted to marry an employee well-being strategy and gamification to address that dilemma through a program called “High Five.”
Creating High Five was a team that included Matt Vance of Salal Credit Union, Rachel Langtry of Credit Union 1, Kathy Goodell of NorthCountry FCU, and Damian Jakubczyk of Elevations CU, who acted as spokesperson for the team in an interview with CUToday.info.
The project came about after the team began to learn of just how many American workers don’t feel any sense of connection to their workplace or employer. Jakubczyk said the team asked itself, “What if we could help motivate employees to stop sleepwalking through their day, putting in time without energy or passion? What if we could help them become engaged employees? Employees who work with passion and have a profound connection to their company.”
That led to the team using a number of different means for brainstorming a response, including looking at approaches usedin the ski industry (Epic Mix) and healthcare (Hubbub), Jakubczyk said.
Mix of Tactile Functionality With Visual Experience
According to Jakubczyk, with the High Five program employees will use a variety of methods to interact system.
“As with any type of gaming, a mix of tactile functionality mixed with visual experience, recognition, earning potential and competition among peers will help keep the engagement levels at all-time highs,” said Jakubczyk. “Employers will utilize High Five's functionality to begin the employee engagement experience and then customize the program to meet the needs of the organization. From wellness, to volunteerism, to sales and service goal achievement, High Five is designated to create an all-encompassing employee engagement experience.”
But why should a credit union care? The numbers show why, said Jakubczyk, who cited Gallup’s 2013 State of the American Workplace study that showed engaged employees have significantly higher productivity, profitability and customer ratings, coupled with lower turnover and lower absenteeism.
“Enhancing employees' well-being is a primary tactic for boosting engagement and High Five has created an employee recognition system that fosters a shared sense of belonging and purpose among staff,” he said. “It turns employees into motivated credit union advocates.”
The latter is also the reason or the name, High Five, which Jakubczyk said is frequently used to convey a feeling of encouragement and appreciation. “Our solution does just that in a virtual world. Plus, it allowed us a plethora of synonyms and metaphors, such as applause, hands-on, standing ovation, thumbs up, et cetera.”
To bring High Five to life it was protoyped using Visual Studio and C# Microsoft SQL Server. The fully functional web-based application was published to the Microsoft Azure cloud.
Program Is Tested
To test High Five, Jakubczyk said the i3 team formed small pilot groups at four credit unions for a one-month test period. During the pilot, employees were welcomed to register for High Five and encouraged to earn “badges.”
From the four pilot credit unions, 47 individuals registered to participate. There were 36 total badges available for distribution and 13 reward options.
During the test involving the 47 staff members:
- 181 badges were awarded by program administrators.
- Employees earned an average of 3-5 badges.
- 98 “applauses” were awarded by users.
- 1 redemption request was submitted by a user.
At the conclusion of the test, Jakubczyk said a survey was then administered to the four pilot credit unions. Among the findings:
- 93% of High Five users said they would enjoy the program as part of the recognition offerings at their credit union.
- The majority of users stated their favorite part of High Five was peer recognition, with earning badges and completing challenges a distant second and third.
- Staff reported lack of time as the reason for receiving two or fewer badges.
- Of staff that earned more than five badges, the majority did so because they liked the competition.
Jakubczyk said that as part of the Human Center Design and Agile Development methodology, the team was able to use the feedback it received during the pilot to make quick improvements to the solution. Those changes included ease of registration, ability to “like” and provide comments and Badge assignments, and ability to select one’s own rewards.
The team conducted two tests for engaging staff. The first introduced the program and then did minimal follow-up. The results were just what the team assumed would happen; a few employees engaged but most did not. A second test included frequent encouragement from the program administrator helped to increase staff engagement and participation.
With the project’s development now behind the team, Jakubczyk noted that High Five was a featured concept in the last round of i3 innovation ideas, and that at least one of the credit unions is interested in pursuing the concept and launching it to its staff.
The i3 Experience
Looking back on his i3 experience, Jakubczyk said it has “provided me with a methodology and processes to innovation. It taught me that new innovations don’t just happen, but rather follow a deliberate approach, including the focus on a problem, vetting of ideas that have potential, nourishment, and iterations of user feedback to quickly improve your solution. In addition, i3 taught me the importance of speed of delivery and that when multiple curious thought leaders come together, great things can happen.:
Credit unions, Jakubczyk believes, are “in the unique position of being able to collaborate with each other, improve on each other’s ideas, and help each other to foster a better experience for the member. Frequently, credit unions become stale and limit their innovation focus to ‘how things have always been done.’ Fostering innovation within a credit union while shedding the tunnel-vision, learning from experiences of peers and outside perspectives can greatly accelerate the type and impact of pursued ideas. Most importantly, having a deliberate innovation process in place can improve the odds of good innovations being delivered quickly.”