Are video games the source of the generation gap in the workplace?

In Gadgets, Games, and Gizmos for Learning, author Karl M Kapp offers tools and techniques for transferring knowledge from boomers to gamers. Kapp suggests that the gamer generation, has “grown up in the video game world of immersion, unlimited do-overs, and instant feedback. The result is that they have verifiably different mind-sets, attitudes, and behaviors regarding business, education, and culture from those who did not grow up playing video games”. According to Kapp, gamers learn differently from Boomers. Playing electronic games has created a learning style for the gamers that:

• Aggressively ignores formal instruction

• Leans heavily toward trial and error (the Reset button is only a click away).

• Encourages exploration and interactive adventures.

• Includes learning from peers but little learning from boomers

• Is consumed in very small bits, exactly when the learner wants usually right before it is needed.

Kapp makes a strong case for the basis of the generation gap between baby boomers and gamers being the hours upon hours of video game play that gamers logged before entering the workplace. By the time a student graduates from college she will have played over 10,000 hours of computerized games. Kapp contends that gamers have “different models about how the world works, how to succeed, how to learn, how to teach, and how to work together.” Gamers have been influenced by video games in the same way that baby boomers were influenced by television.

Research into the use of video games has shown that the learning induced by playing video games occurs quickly and generalizes outside of the gaming experience. All those long hours of playing video wasn’t rotting their brains after all! What gamers learn while they are playing video games can be transferred to the real world and actually increases their ability to quickly assess a situation and determine what to do next. Gamers are able to multi-task effortlessly and require multiple channels to stay engaged

If Kapp and his research are correct, then having an understanding of the differences between generations is far from being enough. Organizations cannot expect to use old paradigms to transfer knowledge to a new generation. To truly connect the generations and facilitate tacit knowledge transfer, organizational leaders must tap into the gamer’s love of gadgets and need to be connected. Optimal knowledge transfer will occur when leaders can tap into the existing inclinations of the gamers and provide strategic learning opportunities in harmony with the way they learn and acquire new information.