I’ve been looking at the growing connection between gaming and thought leadership this week. I know, I know. It’s hard to utter thought leadership in the same breath as video games, avatars, and conversation balloons, but all of these pieces have converged.

Turns out that video games have a role in making the complex (i.e., almost every B2B service ever created) explainable.

Think about it. Case studies are great for building trust, but they don’t do something that video games do by default: put the user at the center of the experience. Ask anyone forced to sit out a video game session while his (gamers are mostly guys) friends play and they’ll tell you that experience trumps observation every time.

Games destroy complexity
An example of what I’m talking about is IBM’s Innov8 online game. This game deals with two of the most complex issues in B2B technology today: business process management (BPM) and service oriented architecture (SOA).

Now in its second generation, the game is part PlayStation and part knowledge management repository. It aggregates some of the typical decision scenarios that IBM customers must make when trying to improve processes in three major areas: customer service, supply chain, and transportation.

In the customer service game for example, you learn through some earnest virtual characters that there are two big issues in BPM for customer service. First, after receiving advice from virtual characters you get three chances to map the process—i.e., how should calls flow through to our call center?—with points for picking the most logical flow. Second, you play with business rules for automating the processes you’ve just mapped—i.e., if we want to cross-sell and up sell, what percentage of calls should be routed through our most experienced call representatives vs. our less experienced (and less costly) representatives?

The connection between gaming and thought leadership
The game succeeds in a number of ways. First, it frames the discussion of BPM in a way that makes sense and that connects it to business results. Second, it establishes IBM as an expert—after all, if you developed the game, you must understand how this is done, right? Finally, as you play with the business rules and see the impact they have on revenues, you get a visual, visceral demonstration of the role that IT automation plays in business performance—which helps IBM sell its Websphere SOA software (the stuff that enables the automation).

They call these things serious games. I think they will force us to seriously rethink our approaches to thought leadership. What do you think?

Related articles by Zemanta

• Integrating mobile into B2B marketing (christopherakoch.com)