Multiversity, an e-learning provider based in India, ended 2022 with great news: they won a Gold LearnX award for Best Simulation, within the Best e-learning Design category, thanks to a scenario-based, gamified simulation created for Hindustan Unilever with the Editor, Gamelearn’s authoring tool. This award focuses on e-learning projects that use modern design methods for interactive learning scenarios to drive and support talent development, and Multiversity’s team has proven their mastery of a creative tool like the Editor to generate the best training product.
We talked with Nachiketas Bhatkar, CEO of Multiversity, and Vaishnavi Parkar, VP of e-learning, to get all the details about their award-winning game and the process behind its creation.
Meeting the challenge
Hindustan Unilever runs the Changemakers program in association with some of the leading management schools across India, such as the Indian Institute of Management (IIM). By offering them a summer internship, this program is an exclusive opportunity to immerse management students into the world of business and build a strong foundation for their management studies.
With this program, Hindustan Unilever had an opportunity to attract top talent to their brand, and they wanted to give everyone the experience of working with Unilever, even before the internship. This would also help the Unilever team to select the right candidates for the organization.
Considering most participants in the program are Gen Z, they needed to find a solution that was engaging, highly interactive, applicable to the real world, and, most importantly, fun for the learners.
Creating effective training to engage the future generations
With this in mind, Multiversity suggested a scenario-based learning approach with gamification, a serious game to give learners the opportunity to experience working at Unilever, understand their culture, and learn about their business model. The students would be engaged through gamification and storytelling and, by using real-life cases, simulations, and personalized feedback, they could ensure that participants would improve their skill set.
Scenarios were designed to be challenging for learners, giving them the ability to practice what they learned, make decisions, get feedback, and learn from their decisions. Practicing on-the-job skills builds confidence and gives the learner the ability to easily apply the knowledge to real-life work.
The team at Multiversity created a simulated university campus environment, where learners navigated through different parts of the campus, including a classroom, lobby, library, computer lab, auditorium, etc.
The story created for the game followed a new product launch at Hindustan Unilever. In this game-based story, the learner was the protagonist. With details such as the consumer demography defined, the learner’s goal was to develop a launch strategy for the product.
Learners could complete this challenge by following the steps for a product launch defined through the learning content and reference materials provided, making decisions at each stage.
While participants navigated through the campus, they were learning new concepts, facing challenges, taking quizzes, and moving on to the next levels in the game. Each level had a different scenario to be solved. And each of these scenarios contained learning content, quizzes, and mini-games. The scenarios also had different 3D environments and 3D characters that the protagonist interacted with, learning new concepts and taking up new challenges along the way.
This interactive game was designed to help learners reach their full potential by way of engaging learning experiences applicable to their lives. Real-world environments were simulated using 3D assets. Gamification elements such as scoring, badges, timers, and leaderboards were integrated into the serious game.
The course also had custom reports and analytics for the Unilever team on time spent, accuracy, scoring, and leaderboards, to facilitate decision-making regarding participants once they’d finished the game.
The authoring tool that helped make it possible
In order to save on the time and costs that developing such a game through programming would normally require, the Multiversity team opted for an authoring tool to create their award-winning serious game. And the tool they used was none other than Gamelearn’s Editor.
They chose the Editor for multiple reasons, chief among them the fact that it made the overall design and development process quick and easy. In addition to its ease-of-use and intuitive, user-friendly interface, the tool also grants access to video tutorials which helped Multiversity’s designers and developers learn how to use it and get started with the development quickly.
The Editor provides an extensive library of characters, backgrounds, and other 3D assets that meant their team could save a lot of time and effort, as they didn’t have to create their own 3D resources.
“The different elements the Editor offers to build games, such as Objectives, Quizzes, and Mini-Games made the interactions very interesting to develop. Learner engagements were taken care of at every stage.”, says Vaishnavi Parkar, Vice President of e-learning at Multiversity.
What this LearnX award means to Multiversity
Once learners had completed Multiversity’s serious game, 60 students were shortlisted and enrolled to participate in Hindustan Unilever’s Changemakers program. This achievement, along with the overwhelmingly positive feedback from the participants who played the simulation, demonstrates that the team at Multiversity proudly deserves this award.
The global recognition the LearnX Awards have in the L&D industry has cemented Multiversity’s brand identity in this space. In the words of Vaishnavi Parkar, “The jury members who select these awards are renowned professionals representing top brands across the globe. This award gives us visibility and has a positive impact on our business.”
The LearnX Awards were launched in 2008 and are an international, professional awards program that recognizes multiple fields of learning and talent development throughout the corporate, education, public, and not-for-profit sectors worldwide.
Each year, the LearnX Awards shine a light on the most innovative projects and technology solutions that deliver best practices and value to enterprises around the world. As such, a LearnX Award is one of the most prized accolades in the world of learning, talent, and skills development.
