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Just how unacceptable is gaming in the workplace?
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July 20, 1998 Web posted at: 2:31 PM PT by Mark Gibbs |
From...
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(IDG) -- In Doom, you play a Marine who has to escape from a military base on Mars that has been overrun by demons and various other nasties from hell. With an assortment of weapons at your disposal, you must venture into the maze of corridors and rooms, trying to find a way out, whilst all the time fighting the hellspawn that seek to destroy you. . . . Can you do it? Do you have the guts? Grab that shotgun, check your ammo and get to it.
Picture this: It's 5:30 p.m. at the office and a 20-something programmer is showing a 40-something account manager and mother of two how to select a chainsaw and slice up the bad guys in a network version of the computer game Doom.
Alternatively, that same account manager might be caught playing a quick game of solitaire while she drinks a cup of coffee at 11 a.m. Are either of these your idea of a good or desirable use of your corporate computers and networks?
Many managers consider all computer game playing to be a trivial and nonproductive use of corporate resources. But not Charlene Vaughn, a partner at venture capital firm Software Investment Corp. in Pasadena, Calif., who has held senior positions at several companies, including Time Warner, Inc. and Interplay Productions, Inc.
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Letting employees play networked computer games after hours is a good way to encourage social bonding, Vaughn says. In her experiences, games have fostered cooperation and camaraderie rather than the competitiveness one might expect. And as she points out, "Slicing up your boss with a chainsaw or vaporizing him with a plasma gun can have therapeutic qualities."
But game playing is addictive for many people, so Vaughn says it's crucial to establish corporate guidelines on acceptable usage. Simon Hudson, production manager for Rapid Blue Interactive, an Internet development house in Randburg, South Africa, also finds guidelines necessary.
"We tolerate games being played on the network - within reason. We recently had a blowout between various members of our staff when games were being played at pretty much any time of the day," Hudson says.
"Needless to say when some folks are under the stress of a tight deadline and others aren't, this can cause a problem."
Hudson had to introduce some rules, such as "no network games during designated working hours, respect and consideration is king at all times and keep the volume down," he says. The guidelines appear to be working. However, gaming can have some productivity consequences that you probably didn't consider.
"In the high-tech community, you have literally legions of network gamers after hours. The LANs get saturated from huge multiplayer games of Quake or Doom," says David Knight, co-founder of multimedia software developer RedBox Technologies, Inc. in Los Altos, Calif., and one of the first to develop multiplayer games.
"The problem is that after the office workers left was traditionally when the technicians and creative types got down to serious work - now they commandeer the network to virtually execute each other over and over again. It is hard to determine whether this catalyzes the creative process or merely burns time," he says.
Knight also points out that with all of the attention and resources being focused on network control and policy management, network managers should specifically monitor game-related activities so they know if game playing is getting out of hand.
Dr. Tessa Warschaw, a Los Angeles-based psychotherapist who specializes in corporate negotiation, has a somewhat different perspective. "I advocate playing games. They can be used as a relaxing break to depressurize and as a way of developing corporate culture," she says.
The way in which game playing affects the organization depends on management's trust in its staff, the staff's judgement and the appropriateness of both the game itself and the time and place it occurs, Warschaw says. The size of the company also heavily influences the way game playing is perceived.
"CEOs in small companies tend to exert more control than in large companies and tend to be less tolerant of what they see as nonproductive behavior," Warschaw says.
"Management and staff need to buy into a definition of acceptable conduct in game playing as in any other aspect of individual conduct," she says.
So while computer games can have a positive impact on your corporation, you should set standards and let staff know what's acceptable and what's not. You might also make it known whether it's acceptable to chainsaw the boss.
Gibbs is a writer, contributing editor and columnist to Network World, and a consultant who has never managed to stay alive in a game of Doom for more than a few minutes.