One of the few benefits of the pandemic is that it has exposed workplace culture issues that have gone unresolved for decades. Ironically, while they spend most of their time holed up in their homes, the workers have enjoyed an unusual level of freedom over the past eighteen months. The heyday of remote work has proven that people don't need to be chained to desks to be productive, nor do they need to be watched like a hawk. Meanwhile, school closings and other mitigating circumstances have allowed employees to work outside of the usual 9 to 5 hours. As the world emerges from the pandemic, companies will need to carefully consider what elements of this new work culture they will uphold and what they will suppress. Some will seek to go back to old ways of working almost entirely, as there is no better productivity hack than getting people together in the office. However, according to Tom Fairey, CEO and co-founder of Stakester, this transition period created fertile ground for experimentation. Instead of retreating to their comfort zone, he says, companies should look for ways to take advantage of the positive cultural change brought about by the pandemic. "A start-up is just an experience," he told TechRadar Pro. "A lot of start-ups talk about testing products or marketing strategies, but few talk about testing culture." “We don't want to create a culture where people arrive at XNUMX am, take their lunch break in the middle of the day, and go home at night. If you want to bring out the best in people, that just doesn't make sense. Although Fairey has produced a number of essays in recent months, one of his most successful ideas has been to give employees an hour of gaming a day, whenever they want.
A new trend
Founded in 1, Stakester is a mobile platform for Android and iOS that connects those looking to play video games (like FIFA, CoD, and Rocket League) competitively, with real money at stake. Before a match starts, each player deposits a sum of money, which fluctuates between €XNUMX and €XNUMX. The role of the Stakester is to facilitate the match, but also to govern the rules and make sure that there is no foul play in progress. At first glance, Stakester looks a lot like a gaming rig, and by technical definition, it could be. Mas Fairey claims that he is adamantly against the idea of gambling, whereby the company only lets its users play games of skill and only in an individual context.
Tom Fairey, Principal at Stakester (Image credit: Stakester) With most people spending more time at home than usual, Stakester has taken off since the start of the year. According to Fairey, the company currently has 500 active users and is growing between XNUMX and XNUMX% per month. And the most committed players on the platform have participated in hundreds and hundreds of different matchups. However, checking this data, Fairey noticed another trend. Activity on the Stakester platform showed a XNUMX% increase in the number of people playing video games between the hours of XNUMXpm and XNUMXpm. It was fair to assume that at least a portion of this increase could be attributed to those working from home. Captivated by the idea that gambling could play a role in creating a healthier workday, Fairey resolved to use his employees as guinea pigs. And he was pleasantly surprised by the results.
The beauty of the competition
Although he does not have specific data to support his assertions, Fairey told us that productivity levels have been significantly higher since the introduction of the new gaming policy. He also says that relationships among team members have strengthened, that his staff are able to solve problems more creatively, and that people are actively choosing to spend more time in the office. When asked if the success of his experiment uncovered anything concrete about gaming as a medium, Fairey told us that he thinks he speaks more to the value of one particular factor in gaming: competition. While not every employee chooses the one-hour option at Stakester, many do. And Fairey says that most choose to play multiplayer games against each other, as opposed to more meditative single-player titles. The company has a bot on Slack for random employee matching, which means staff are encouraged to form closer relationships with people outside of their immediate team or department. And while there have been feverish contests, people are generally in a better mood, Fairey reports. His theory is that the positive effects of competition in a gaming environment are similar to those of physical exercise; In the same way as physical exercise, the game requires both the concentration of the players (and therefore suppresses any work-related inconvenience that could play on the psyche) and raises the heart rate above the normal level. As an avid athlete, Fairey believes these qualities are essential in helping employees stay productive throughout the day. “We want to be the best company to work for. To do this, we seek to create an athletic mindset; we accept that work + rest = success”, he explained. "You would never expect an athlete to do their best for 4 hours straight. So creating an environment where people are encouraged to actively rest has a number of benefits: people are healthier, more relaxed and they can give your brain a chance to reset.” Naturally, Stakester is a very specific genre of business, already built on the foundation of competition and already integrated into the gaming ecosystem. However, Fairey insists that an experiment like his would spawn exactly the same genre of games. Results in any business. "Essentially, I think most companies make the mistake of trying to deal with the symptoms of low productivity after the fact, instead of trying to encourage people to be healthier, both mentally and physically," he told us. “Of course, different people escape in different ways. But really, it's about letting people know that it's okay to take a break.