Use Crowdsourcing to Tap into Achievement Stories and Drive Results

With simple and straightforward crowdsourcing tools, finding achievement stories is as simple as asking one question and sitting back to watch how people feed off each other’s answers and ignite engagement.

In the January 2013 T+D magazine article, “Feasting on Achievement,” I explored how achievement stories have a catalytic effect within organizations. Basically, stories can speed the value and potency of learning. To say this more pointedly: Good news begets good news, and the notion that we can use achievement stories to fuel further achievement is a powerful one.

Let’s say we all agree on that idea. If so, it begs the question: What if you could make achievements contagious in your organization? I’m here to tell you that you can. More importantly, you must.

Enter Crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing is an emerging and relatively easy way to draw out success stories—to create buzz and momentum around them. With simple and straightforward crowdsourcing tools, finding achievement stories is as simple as asking one question and sitting back to watch how people feed off each other’s answers and ignite engagement.

What if you could ask one achievement question following your next learning program? What would that question be? How would you seek to fuel achievement stories that create the kind of value we defined in the “Feasting on Achievement” article?

Case in Point

The New York-New York Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, launched a change initiative focused on improving guest service and employee engagement, a program centered on innovative training strategies to engage the organization from top to bottom. The objective was to improve on the company’s already high customer service and guest experience ratings.

New York-New York used We Achieve® for crowdsourcing to address three priorities:

1. Gather immediate feedback and best practices

2. Share success stories about how the change initiative was working

3. Measure the program’s effectiveness.

In response, New York-New York employees submitted written stories, illustrated with digital media.

The most powerful results came from a simple question that asked employees to share heartwarming guest stories. Employee stories were shared across the New York-New York organization and at the corporate level with parent company MGM Resorts International, including the corporate newsletter and executive communications.

According to Greg Chase, manager of training and HR at New York-New York, the ongoing use of crowdsourcing adds a level of accountability and competition among the resort’s managers to ensure they are actively promoting cultural change in their teams.

Bottom line: Crowdsourcing can make achievement contagious in your organization. It’s as easy as asking your people to promote their own achievements—and then watch as the process catches fire.