What is the relationship between management control and gamification?
management control is a process that enables companies to monitor and manage costs and revenues to achieve financial and strategic goals. Gamification is the use of game mechanisms in nongame contexts to motivate and engage users. Enterprise gamification, on the other hand, is distinguished by implementing mechanics borrowed from gaming to introduce complex processes and innovations in large organizations to support and benefit employees.
But what do two worlds seemingly so far apart have to do with each other?
Management control and gamification have a much closer relationship than it might seem because they both focus on using data to make informed decisions and improve business performance.
Management control is concerned with collecting, integrating, and analyzing data to monitor and evaluate business performance. Gamification, on the other hand, is the use of game mechanics to motivate and engage employees in business processes.
When you combine gamification with management control, you get a winning solution for data collection. Gamification allows you to design processes that generate more data, involving all departments in the organization.
In this way, implicit data on employee behavior and the entire business network are obtained, which can be used to make informed decisions and improve business performance.
In summary, gamification allows more data to be collected, fully engaging the entire network of organizations.
As we have said, therefore, data are fundamental to management control because they enable monitoring and evaluation of business performance and informed decision making.
However, collecting accurate and reliable data can be difficult, especially if the company does not have an effective data collection system built into its technology infrastructure. in fact, many organizationshave an infrastructure built over time, divided across multiple platforms and tools, and have not always integrated all the information into a single analysis tool. Moreover, even if data are collected, it can be difficult to analyze them quickly and draw meaningful conclusions.
There is no shortage of data, the problem is almost always aggregating it correctly and knowing how to interpret it
Sure! drill-down operations allow instantaneous extractions of all data thanks to extraordinary BI platforms capable of organizing information in the optimal way, but is that really the point?
the problem would seem to be different, it would indeed seem to be a priority rather to define well upstream the data to be analyzed and consequently to set equally clear and precise actions then to be able to calculate their ROI and understand their cause and effect relationship.
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Gamification can help overcome these problems.
Using motivation mechanisms derived from the logic of gaming, gamification can engage employees at all levels of the company and encourage the use of data collection technologies. In this way, implicit data, such as the daily activities of employees, can be collected, which can provide valuable information for management control. In addition, gamification can help make data collection more fun and engaging for employees, which can increase the quality of obtainable processes and consequently the data collected.
gamification enables the creation of more inductive and engaging data collection processes for employees
Gamification therefore can help overcome the typical difficulties of data collection and analysis for management control, making it more engaging and fun for employees to collect and use data, and thus increasing the quality of the data collected. This enables the company to become higher-performing and make informed decisions, becoming a data-driven company.
The new role of the CFO in organizations
The CFO’s job consequently to the tools now to day available is profoundly changing, becoming sempre more of a leadership role that requires greater vision and breadth than in the past. This is largely due to new technologies, such as employee experience, HR , HR management and CRM platforms, which allow for direct, streaming data from management and not just reports.
These technologies enable the CFO to have a more complete and detailed view of the company as they collect real-time data on employee performance, customer experience, and business performance. This enables the CFO to make more informed decisions and constantly monitor the company’s performance.
New tools, new data, new management methods
In addition, these technologies enable the collection of implicit data on employee behavior and the entire corporate network, and this is where it becomes especially valuable for management control. However, this data can be difficult to collect and analyze if employees are not involved and motivated.
Gamification can help overcome these problems, as it uses game mechanisms to engage employees and encourage the use of data collection technologies. This makes it possible to collect implicit data on employee behavior and the entire corporate network, which is especially valuable for management control.
New technologies therefore are profoundly changing the CFO’s job, allowing for greater insight and breadth than in the past and enabling the collection of implicit data on employee behavior and the entire corporate network. Gamification can help engage employees and make data collection more fun and engaging, which increases the quality of the data collected and enables the company to become higher performing and make informed decisions.
What are the main advantages given by management control?
- Increased output: increased employee productivity means that the company can produce more goods or services with the same number of employees or with the same budget.
- Cost reduction: increased employee productivity can lead to reduced costs because there are fewer resources needed to produce the same output.
3 Improved quality of processes: increased employee productivity can also lead to improved quality of work, as employees have more time to focus on individual tasks and hone their skills.
4 Greater employee satisfaction: a work environment in which productivity is valued and incentivized can lead to greater employee satisfaction, who will feel more motivated and fulfilled.
5 Market competitiveness: a company with a high level of employee productivity is more competitive in the market because it can offer higher quality goods or services at lower prices than its competitors.
What benefits can this new approach to management control bring?
The role of the CFO is evolving and requires new skills to be performed effectively. Whereas in the past the main focus was understanding the relationship between debts and credits and finding ways to obtain financing from banks, today the CFO must have a thorough understanding of the entire business to generate savings and create value.
Traditional background remains essential to do the job properly, but this represents only the tip of the iceberg of the skills required. Today’s CFOs must and will increasingly need to be able to identify and understand the key factors that influence a business, such as actual operations, what makes customers satisfied, and opportunities and threats to business growth.
A central skill of the CFO is undoubtedly analytics, which enables him or her to manage and analyze data collected through new data collection systems and to use this data to make informed decisions. Today, however, with the increase in implicit data, the CFO must be able to use this data to better understand the behaviors and activities of employees and the entire corporate network.
The new role of the CFO and the paradigm shift
In addition to analytical competence, the CFO must also have strategic competence to manage the data collected and use it to achieve the company’s goals. This requires a much broader vision of management and the ability to effectively communicate this vision to stakeholders and all departments of the company . In this way, it will be possible to optimize results and increase the financial credibility of the organization.
In summary, the CFO must possess analytical and strategic skills to manage new data collection systems and new types of implicit data, and must have a 360-degree view of management and be able to communicate it properly to all departments in the company. This will optimize results and increase the financial credibility of the entire organization.
How can BI impact management control by supporting the role of the CFO?
Business Intelligence (BI) is a set of technologies, processes and methods that enable the collection, integration, Analyze and present business data to support informed decision making. BI can have a significant impact on management control because it allows business performance to be monitored and evaluated more effectively.
Today, the adoption of business intelligence (BI) criteria in management control. is no longer limited to reports and excel sheets full of data to cross-reference and analyze. BI allows you to collect, integrate, analyze and present business data quickly and easily, making it possible to make informed decisions.
The CFO must be able to access accurate and reliable information in a timely manner to build a competitive advantage. To gain maximum benefit from BI, it is important that he or she be able to operate on massive and granular data, i.e., data that is not pre-aggregated. It is also necessary for the data collected to be correct and regularly updated, and for there to be constant cleaning of inputs before they are fed to analytical platforms.
To get the maximum benefit from BI, it is important that it be able to operate on massive, granular data, i.e., data that is not pre-aggregated. This provides a more detailed and accurate view of business performance and identifies trends and issues that might be hidden in aggregate data.
Performance data driven is not a method is an endpoint
The ability to operate on massive and granular data enables the company to become a data-driven performance organization, where decisions are made based on data and not on intuition or experience.
Examples of data and decisions in management control that can be supported by BI:
- Cost analysis: identify the highest cost items and find ways to reduce them.
- Sales analysis: monitor sales trends and identify the most profitable products or markets.
- Productivity analysis: monitor employee productivity and identify factors affecting it.
- Customer analysis: identifying the most profitable customers and the factors that make them so.
- Supplier analysis: evaluate the performance of suppliers and identify those that provide the best prices and quality.
- Cash flow analysis: monitor cash flows and identify cash flow problems.
- Risk analysis: identify the risks the company is facing and the factors that cause them.
- Analysis of performance against goals: monitor performance against goals and identify factors affecting performance.
- Profitability analysis: calculate the contribution margin by product or service and identify factors that influence profitability.
- Business process analysis: identifying areas of inefficiency in business processes and the factors that cause them.
Performance data driven
Thus, we have said that data-driven performance is an approach in which business decisions are made based on data collected and analyzed, rather than relying on intuition or experience. This allows the company to get a more accurate and detailed view of business performance and to identify trends and problems that might be hidden in aggregate data.
- Invest in data collection technology: it is important to have an effective data collection system in place to collect accurate and reliable data.
- Involve employees: to collect implicit data on the behaviors of employees and the entire business network, it is important to involve employees and encourage the use of data collection technologies.
- Train your team on data analysis: it is important for the team to be able to analyze the data collected and draw conclusions from it
The benefits of performance data driven for the CFO
The benefits of performance data driven are innumerable it is worth pointing out, however, that full implementation requires a number of technology implementations and integration of flows that if not implemented will not achieve the following benefits:
- Improved forecast accuracy: data collection platforms enable large amounts of data to be collected and analyzed, allowing greater accuracy in forecasting trends and tendencies.
- Offer personalization: data collection platforms allow detailed customer information to be collected and used to personalize the offer and improve customer satisfaction.
- Identification of new market opportunities: data collection platforms enable the collection and analysis of market-related data and the identification of new opportunities for companies.
- Reduce costs: data collection platforms enable efficient data collection and analysis, enabling companies to reduce operational costs.
5 Productivity improvement: data collection platforms enable employees’ performance data to be collected and analyzed and used to improve productivity.
6 Problem prevention: data collection platforms allow data on problems to be collected and analyzed and used to prevent future problems.
Therefore, employee experience applications are a great tool for data collection because they allow data on employee needs and preferences to be collected and analyzed. This data can be used to improve employees’ work experience and increase their satisfaction and productivity.
Want to further explore the potential of employee experience platforms, read the specific article on the topic here.
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