Megan Vrolijk

I am commenting on the article called Software Firm's Got Game. The report covers ExperiencePoint, a company engaged in making "serious gaming." They produce a set of scenarios to train executives on how to handle business situations. It is explained as:

In a typical exercise, participants work in teams to gather information from the simulation. Then they have to work together to decide on the biggest problems facing the imaginary troubled company, what solutions are appropriate and how to implement them. The teams get immediate feedback as the sophisticated program shows how many employees accept the new strategy, and how many resist the changes.

It is highly appropriate that in the West there would become companies like ExperiencePoint that would utilize a medium that has been engaged in by the younger generation by the majority of one's life. In many ways, the use of a game to train individuals is not at all new. However, it is interesting that the reactions of the employees is recorded within the game, changing the way an executive may perceive real life decisions. The question of how our interactions with the world change when we have previously engaged in them on an artificial level has been engaged when talking about other technologies. Whether the realization of employees as individuals (which often becomes distorted at some level in capitalism) is morphed by this game is debatable. A study on the perception of the workers after this game has been used would probably show change in how the individual then interacts as a person of authority within the company. I also wonder if this kind of training game could be compared to any other kind of training game.