International Journal of Sociotechnology and Knowledge Development

Volume 9 • Issue 1 • January-March 2017

A Review on Gamification and its

Potential to Motivate and Engage
Employees and Customers:
Employee Engagement through Gamification
Anchal Gupta, VIT University, VIT Business School, Vellore, India
Gomathi S., VIT University, VIT Business School, Vellore, India

ABSTRACT

The concept of gamification uses the human behavior of indulging in gaming activities and combines it
with their work with the purpose of enhancing, employee engagement. Game mechanics and dynamics
are able to positively influence human behavior because they are designed to drive the players above
the activation threshold. Achievements, appointments, bonuses, levels, points are some of the game
mechanics which are used for influencing human behavior and human desires. These human desires
have been referred to as game dynamics. The applications of Gamification range from being useful
in the internal organizational processes of recruitment, employee recognition, employee performance,
training programs, wellness and safety as well as customer oriented applications of building brand
loyalty, enhancing customer satisfaction and engagement. This research paper aims to review this
emerging concept, its literature and theoretical development along with a highlight on the present
applications of gamification and their role in enhancing engagement and motivation of the users.

Keywords
Engagement, Game Dynamics, Game Mechanics, Gamification, Motivation

INTRODUCTION

Gaming has usually been looked upon from the viewpoint of being a leisure activity for people to
engage themselves in their free time. Every day, endless number of hours and millions are spent by
people across the globe on computer and video gaming (Ong, 2013). All this time and money ideally
is being spent by people for indulging in a repetitive and non-value adding activity. Gamification was
brought out as a concept to use this human behavior of indulging in gaming activities and combine it
with their work so as to apply the results in the areas of education, customer engagement, employee
engagement and other business and management activities. Concisely, it attempts to bring the concept
of work and play together (Pratskevich, 2014). In 2015, 40% of the largest 1,000 organizations in

DOI: 10.4018/IJSKD.2017010103

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the world have been estimated to apply Gamification techniques while reforming their business
activities (Blohm & Leimeister, 2013). Also, Gamification has made it to the list of being one of
the best technology trends in HR in 2014 conference of Society for Human Resource Management
(Brigade, 2014).
Formally, there are two definitions of Gamification that have been widely followed by
academicians and industry. Firstly, Gamification is defined as ‘use of game design elements in non-
gaming context’ (Deterding, Dixon, Khaled & Nacke, 2011a). Further, it has been also defined as
‘a process of providing affordances for gameful experiences which support the customers’ overall
value creation’ (Huotari & Hamari, 2012). The definition given by Huotari and Hamari (2012) has
been written considering the customers to be value creators for the companies who in return attempt
to make customers experience gameful and enjoyable. From game design viewpoint, gamification
is considered to be a part of human computer interaction (HCI) where the researchers of the field
are aiming to develop appropriate model, techniques and heuristics for the application of games.
The aim is to create gamified information systems that are effective for the companies (Deterding,
Sicart, Nacke, Hara & Dixon, 2011b). There is a strong positive belief about the effectiveness of
Gamification in business operations based on the premise that gaming is believed to be an enjoyable
and any process involving that mechanism would too be engaging and motivating (Hamari, 2013).
The basic principle of Gamification focuses on utilizing the engagement derived out of game playing
which is being applied by business corporations (Levy, 2012).
As a concept, Gamification is being applied by the companies to enhance employee engagement
and motivate them to perform their job responsibilities with more enthusiasm. Also, the technique
aims to engage the consumers and get them to participate, share and interact through an activity/
community. Gamification technique exploits the inherent human desires for competition, achievement,
status, self-expression, altruism and closure. The core tactic of gamification lies in providing rewards
for the players who accomplish their tasks. The different types of game mechanics or rewards that
are being used include points, badges or levels, virtual currency provided to the user (Rishi & Goyal,
2013). The need for such a technology trend can be attributed to the change in workforce composition
of companies which now are dominated by echo boomers/Gen Y. This generation is hugely dependent
upon and has grown up under the influence of technology and ecommerce. Technology has changed
their way of communication, engagement and social collaboration with each other. Gamification
serves as an effective tool for the enterprises to engage and interact with their employees and
consumers in a creative manner (Xu, 2011; Rishi & Goyal, 2013). Companies like Nike, Microsoft,
Wipro, MakemyTrip.com, Vodafone and many others have used gamified applications for enhanced
employee and customer experience. The industry wise applications have been discussed in the later
section of the paper. These applications of Gamification range from being applicable in the internal
organizational processes like recruitment, employee recognition, employee performance, training
programs, wellness and safety as well as customer oriented applications of building brand loyalty,
enhancing customer satisfaction and engagement.

METHODOLOGY

The structure of the paper was designed using secondary research and the review was undertaken by
identifying and selecting significant studies for this paper, and a thorough scrutiny was done on the
subject by searching on the Scopus, EBSCOhost, ProQuest, and Emerald and Google databases. A total
of 43 studies have been used to complete the article. This includes 5 empirical papers, 12 conceptual
papers, 2 books, 2 theses and the rest comprises of reports, news and magazine articles. The decision

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to include or exclude the studies was made on the basis of their relevance for completing this article.
Owing to the newness of the concept of gamification, many of the studies were conference papers
while only few of them have been published as journal articles. Also, the same factor accounts for the
reason to consider reports and news articles which mostly have been referred to build the applications
section of the article so as to widen the academic literature.
Inductive approach has been used to present the paper wherein we attempt to present the concept
of gamification by studying its history, definitions proposed, frameworks and game mechanics and
dynamics in the theoretical background section. In the next section, we elaborate on the literature
review and then we attempt to provide a glimpse of the applications of gamification across different
organization stressing on their main objective to implement them and thereby try to link the theory
with the applications of gamification to understand the similarity and gaps that need to be addressed
and studied further.

THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

Gamification
The term Gamification can be traced back to 2003, when an entrepreneur, who earlier was a software
engineer, Nick Pelling started a Gamification consultancy called Conundra Ltd, but it failed owing
to the concept being ahead of time and lack of customer interest which led to its shut down in 2006
(Pelling, 2011). In 2007, Bunchball, a highly successful Gamification consultancy today, claims to
have kick started the Gamification industry with the launch of a gamification platform called Nitro
which the companies could apply on their websites, blogs and apps for motivating and engaging its
customers, employees and partners to foster value creating activities. Further they help their clients
by providing solution to boost team motivation, engagement, employee development, increasing
the customer base and loyalty, spreading the brand through online networking. Gamification started
gaining popularity in academia 2010 onwards when the number of articles being written on the
concept increased (Hamari, Koivisto & Sarsa, 2014).
Gamification is said to be persuasive technology that aims to influence the human behavior
by activating individual’s motivation through game design elements (Blohm & Leimeister, 2013).
Game design elements includes game mechanics and game dynamics (Zichermann & Cunningham
2011; Blohm & Leimeister, 2013). Game mechanics are the tools which are used for gamifying an
application while the desires and motivations that emerge from player interaction with the gamified
application are defined by game dynamics (Zichermann & Cunningham 2011). A comprehensive
framework on which the game designing is established is called the MDA (Mechanics, Dynamics
& Aesthetics) framework. This three-level framework helps the game designers conceptualize the
dynamics of game and the desired outcomes from it, based on which they design the gamified
applications (Hunicke, LeBlanc & Zubek, 2004). A list of game mechanics and dynamics widely
applicable has been provided in Table 1.
Points (the first game mechanic listed in Table 1) based gamified application can help in achieving
the primary desire of being rewarded. Then, levels are used as a motivator for the people to improve
their status by achieving a level up, such as moving from being a basic customer to premium customer.
In a scenario where the end user likes to accomplish difficult challenges, they are driven to do that to
get recognized for their achievements. Self-expression aims at the individual’s need to be identified
uniquely, which can be fulfilled by the virtual goods which enable the users to create a virtual identity
that can be used for self-expression. Leaderboards are used extensively in gamification for so that
users can compare their score with others and feel competitive to perform better. Gamification uses
altruism as a retention vehicle by making the users send gifts to each other that drives them to take
more interest in the gameplay and helps in keeping them involved (Bunchball, 2010). Some other

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Table 1. Game mechanics and game dynamics

Game Mechanics Game Dynamics

Points Reward
Levels Status
Challenges Achievement
Virtual Goods and Spaces Self Expression
Leaderboards Competition
Gifts and Charity Altruism
Source: Bunchball (2010)

game mechanics include badges, trophies, ranks onboarding, feedback and reinforcement, pattern
recognition, surprise and unexpected delight, nurturing and growing which are used for designing
gamified applications (Zichermann & Cunningham, 2011). This list of game mechanics and dynamics
is not exhaustive and gives a reflection of the various game mechanics and associated dynamics
that can be applied in a game design. There are many others that have been listed in range of other
resources and above presented mechanics and dynamics can be said to form a core set.

Theoretical Frameworks
The underlying reason to use gamification is based on its potential to influence some of the significant
concepts of engagement, motivation, behavioral change and productivity (Andrzej Marczewski, 2013).
Most of the empirical studies on gamification till date have attempted to gauge the effect of gamification
on behavioral and psychological outcomes (Hamari et al., 2014). Muntean (2011) studied the Fogg’s
Behaviour Model and its application in student engagement in e-learning through gamification. The
model is composed of three elements namely, motivation, ability and trigger. When these three elements
occur simultaneously, they are expected to generate the desired behavior. The model is suitable for the
studies focused upon human computer interaction, as is the case of gamification. Aparicio et al. (2012)
linked gamification with the self-determination theory of motivation by Ryan and Deci. The theory
states that intrinsic motivation of human beings is linked with sports and gambling and autonomy,
competence and relatedness are the three psychological and social needs essential to maintain that
intrinsic motivation. Any activity that individuals perform for pleasure only without any conditioning,
come under intrinsically motivated activities. Based on self-determination theory, they proposed to
follow a set of activities that would make the gamification effective. Blohm and Leimeister (2013)
presented different game mechanics and game dynamics and the associated motives to apply them
which included intellectual curiosity, social recognition, achievement, cognitive stimulation and
self-determination. They also based their theoretical premise on the concept of intrinsic and extrinsic
motivation given by Ryan and Deci (2000) and highlighted the ability of gamified applications to
arouse intrinsic motivation of the users. Hamari and Koivisto (2013) conducted an empirical research
on social motivations among the users of gamified applications for a physical exercise called Fitocracy.
They based their framework on theory of planned behavior by Ajzen (1991) which focuses on the
behavioral intentions of people and is applicable to measure attitude of individuals in a persuasive
environment and found the social factors like social influence, recognition, reciprocal benefit to have
strong influence on user perception of the gamified exercise and their willingness to use it in future
as well as recommending it to others. Nicholson (2012) elucidated theories which can be applied in
user centered meaningful gamification. He elaborated on organismic integration theory, situational
relevance, situated motivational affordance, universal design for learning and player generated content.

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LITERATURE REVIEW

One of the first attempts to research on and define gamification in academic literature was done by
Deterding and his colleagues, where they try to investigate the origin, related concepts and define the
term gamification. They proposed the definition for gamification as ‘use of game design elements in
non-game contexts’ (Deterding, Dixon, Khaled & Nacke, 2011a). Another definition that is widely
accepted was given by Houtari and Hamari, wherein they attempted to define gamification from a
service marketing perspective. They defined gamification as ‘a process of enhancing a service with
affordances for gameful experiences in order to support user’s overall value creation’ (Huotari &
Hamari, 2012). The definition proposed by Deterding and colleagues is a concept based definition
focusing on the use of game elements, whereas the definition proposed by Houtari and Hamari throws
a light on the agenda of using gamification and the experience derived from using gamified processes
which is to support user’s overall value creation. A standard definition of gamification that is widely
accepted is the one proposed by Deterding and his colleagues. Scott Nicholson (2012) proposed a
slight modification in the definition as ‘Integration of user-centered game design elements into non-
game context’ and called it meaningful gamification.
Hamari et al. (2014) examined the state of literature review available on gamification, wherein
they highlighted that the topic has been written about from 2010 onwards in academia and it has
been on a rise since then. They carried out their research through all the major databases including
EBSCOHost, Proquest, Scopus, Web of Science, ACM Digital Library and Google Scholar and
based on the reported results in those studies, the authors suggested that gamification is effective
with its conceptual framework being based upon motivational affordances like points, leaderboards,
badges, levels, feedback, rewards, progress and challenges. These motivational affordances served
as independent variables in the studies examined with psychological or behavioral outcomes being
the outcome variables. Blohm and Leimeister (2013) linked the game design elements with the
individual motivations, like usage of rankings would help the gamified application users achieve a
sense of social recognition. Similarly, time pressure, tasks and quests when incorporated in a gamified
design would lead to cognitive stimulation at the individual users end. Some of the empirical studies
conducted by researchers have produced different results in terms of mapping the effectiveness of
gamification. In a one and half year field study conducted on the users of Sharetribe, a peer-to-peer
trading service which was gamified by incorporating badges reported a positive association between
the users actively making social comparisons by tracking other users badges and their activities of
usage of service, listing goods for trade, commenting and completing transactions and posting trade
proposals (Hamari, 2013). Another study proposed to use the intrinsic motivation of individuals
for games and apply it through a series of activities to effectively implement gamification, starting
from identifying the objective of the task to be gamified, followed by understanding the underlying
objectives which people find interesting and motivating and then selecting the game mechanics that
connect the objectives with the human motivation. The authors intended to use the service quality
model to analyze the effectiveness of gamification by comparing the values with those obtained
before gamification (Aparicio et al., 2012). A thesis study examining the effect of gamification
of a diagnosis task by implementing points on the performance through perceptual learning of the
participants confirmed significant improvement in their performance, implying an effective perceptual
learning by the application of game mechanics (Ong, 2013). Neeli (2012) from Infosys Labs, India
has highlighted gamification to be a potential method to engage employees in BPO industry. In his
article, he has proposed implementation of gamification at superficial, integrated and embedded
levels through which game mechanics are applied in different ways so as to enhance engagement
and motivation levels. Another research work stresses on the inclusion of game mechanics into the
business applications for enhanced employee engagement and motivation through additional incentives
as a possible approach to ensure that geographically distributed engineering and development teams
continue to remain focused on the goals and schedules. The authors also encourage to introduce

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gamification in web platforms (WEB 2.0) and use various game design tools such as points system,
visiting progress bar, badges, web prizes, social engagement loops, challenges and leaderboards for
making it more interactive (Rednic, Toma & Apostu, 2013). An empirical research on the users of
Fitocracy, which is one of the largest physical exercise gamification application reported social factors
like recognition and social influence to be strong predictors of the perception about gamification and
the user intention to continue to use the gamified application in future (Hamari and Koivisto, 2013).
In a progress paper for thesis study, a researcher intends to study the mediating role of employee
engagement between gamification and behavioral outcomes of organizational commitment and usage
intention of the participants, they being the employees working with the organizations implementing
gamification initiatives (Ruhi, 2015). Educational application of gamification has been empirically
researched and focused upon by some of the academicians. Sheth, Bell and Kaiser (2012) observed
greater improvement in courses of those students who used a gameful platform called HALO (Highly
Addictive Socially Optimized Software Engineering) which made software testing enjoyable and
fun for the undergraduate students of computer science in Columbia University, USA. However, it
increased the instructors load to deploy HALO with each assignment which they intend to reduce and
are working upon for improvisation. Another interesting research article talks about the introduction
of social gamification framework into an already established K-6 social learning platform called
schoooools.com used by children, parents and educators in Portugal to benefit from the possible
potential WEB 2.0 and social networking. The authors’ research work is in progress through which
they intend to empirically examine the effectiveness of gamification platform in improving the
motivation and learning potential of students (Simões, Redondo & Vilas, 2013). A dissertation on
gamification examined and elaborated on three different models of gamification to highlight the
potential of gamification as an education strategy in twenty first century (Sierra, 2013).

Applications of Gamification
The most successful applications of gamification are considered to be Nike+ and Foursquare that
helped in establishing gamification as a way to drive engagement (Deterding, 2012). Nike launched a
gamified application, Nike+iPod which can gauge data such as distance, pace and calories burned with
the help of a GPS sensor connected to their iPods. Through this initiative, Nike and Apple intended
to take the running experience of the users to a new level and at the same time build a brand loyalty
for themselves. Whenever users reach a milestone, Nike software rewards the users. Like, if a runner
crosses 5 miles’ distance record, he/she is congratulated by the cycling champ Lance Armstrong.
This technique has lead Nike + to build up a huge fan base. This approach derives from the domain
of game design and is called gamification enriching products, services, and information systems with
game-design elements in order to positively influence motivation, productivity, and behavior of users.
With popularity, they have improvised an ipod app into an online social game. The world’s biggest
coffee chain uses gamification for rewarding its users with virtual points and virtual badges as they
visit their retail stores. Starbucks, in conjunction with location-based social network Foursquare,
enables their customers to “check-in” at their retail locations on their mobile phones. As they do that,
they earn points and can finish some quests, like visiting 4 different Starbuck to get special trophies or
badges. These points have no monetary value, and they are only virtual (Bunchball, 2010). However,
Dennis Crowley, Co-Founder and CEO of Foursquare decided to phase out gamification owing to
user feedback and the positioning problem of Foursquare, as a result of overemphasis on points and
badges (Ivan Kuo, 2013). Several gamification platforms are available in the market which enables
the companies to implement gamified solutions effectively. Some of these include, Badgeville, Big
Door, Bunchball, Cloud Captive, Gamify, Manumatix, SCVNGR, SpectrumDNA (Xu, 2011).
An attempt has been made to highlight the way gamification is being used by the organizations
and understand the desired organizational outcomes they expect to achieve by implementing the
gamified applications. For this purpose, secondary research was carried out through the Google
database to identify reports, articles and such other links on gamification that would help to represent

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different organizational outcomes for the purpose of which gamification has been implemented. This
has been depicted through two tables wherein Table 2 displays the applications with employees being
the target user and Table 3 depicts the applications with the customers being the focus or the target
users. In total, 14 applications have been discussed to understand the organizational perspective
in using gamification. The tables have been divided into five columns: company name, gamified
program name, game mechanics used, objective to use the gamified program and desired outcome.

Interpreting the Theory and Applications of Gamification

The underlying reason to employ gamification is based on its potential to positively motivate and
influence engagement level of employees or customers enabling the organizations to achieve the
desired behavioral outcome from the target user (Andrzej Marczewski, 2013, Hamari et al., 2014).
This is supported by the current literature and the industry applications alike. Also, the game
mechanics and game dynamics have been extensively studied and are applied coherently with the

Table 2. Employee focused gamification

Gamified
Company Game Mechanics Objective Desired Outcome
Program
Employee
Engage and educate employees
InfyPark, theme Engagement
Points and about the value system and
park based game Learning &
Infosys1 Leaderboards organizational culture
Accelerate, cricket Development
Leaderboards Enhancing productivity by
theme Employee
engaging the on bench employees
Performance
Quizzes and Learning &
MakeMyTrip2 TripOn app Company history and policies
Badges Development
Increasing employee participation
for certification in corporate social
Social Media Stories and Learning &
Cognizant3 media policy of Cognizant. Time to
Policy Course Challenges Development
complete certification reduced from
one week to 24 hours
Global Social
Motivating maximum participation Learning &
Cisco4 Media Training Challenges
for training courses Development
Program
Badges,
Increasing participation for the Learning &
Delloite4 Leadership training Leaderboards and
training program Development
Status symbols
Employee
Roadwarrior, a Pre call planning for sales
Engagement
SAP 5
game for training Badges and Points representatives to prepare them for
Learning &
sales reps their customer meeting
Development
Software writing competition for
Quizzes and monetary prize through which
Google 6
Google Code Jam Recruitment
challenges company tries to attract and identify
potential employees for hiring
http://content.timesjobs.com/how-infosys-is-tapping-into-gamification/
1

http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-07-11/news/51354818_1_godrej-consumer-products-gcpl-lupin-pharma
2

3
Tandulwadika, A. (2013). Gamifying Business to Drive Employee Engagement and Performance. Retrieved from http://www.cognizant.
com/InsightsWhitepapers/Gamifying-Business-to-Drive-Employee-Engagement-and-Performance.pdf
4
https://www.cornerstoneondemand.com/rework/5-companies-using-gamification-boost-business-results
5
http://enterprise-gamification.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=71:roadwarrior-how-sap-trains-its-sales-people-on-mobility&catid=1
3&Itemid=17&lang=en
6
https://business.linkedin.com/talent-solutions/blog/recruiting-strategy/2015/5-companies-that-are-successfully-using-gamification-for-recruiting

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Table 3. Customer focused gamification

Gamified Program/ Game Desired

Company Objective
Platform Mechanics Outcome
Samsung Nation, Rewarding users for review writing and Customer
Samsung1 social loyalty Badges participation in forums to increase user Engagement,
program engagement Brand Loyalty
Helps the users plan and manage their
Customer
Personalized Visual cues, personal finances through a gamified
Mint.com2 Engagement and
financial planning goal trackers platform which makes it easier, fun and
participation
engaging
Promoting environment friendly
practices and learning more about
Reward
Recycling and such practices in return for points that People
Recyclebank3 points and
Learning Online can be exchanges for rewards in the Awareness
leaderboards
form discount vouchers from different
vendors
Profile completion status, profile
Progress Customer
strength, endorsement games and many
bars and Engagement,
LinkedIn4 Profile platform other such techniques for engaging
endorsement Brand
and motivating users to maintain and
features Development
upgrade their profile
Social awareness about dowry to the
Dowry Calculator, Points and People
Shaadi.com5 users of the website using gamified
Angry Brides quests Awareness
apps
Motivating the users to get healthy by Customer
Mindbloom. Proof!, life Challenges and taking seven day challenge and sharing awareness,
com6 improvement app rewards the progress with others to win yourself Brand
some prizes and pride Development
Enhance patient engagement. A game
for Type 2 diabetes patient to motivate Patient
Type 2 Travelers Points and
Merck7 them to keep a check on their diabetes Engagement and
project Avatars
and learning about the need to keep it Awareness
under control
Consumer engagement and brand Consumer
Monopoly, Pick n
Coins and development. Monopoly being one Engagement,
McDonalds8 Play game, Catch
tokens of the most renowned games by Brand
One, Super Size Me
McDonalds Development
1
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/223039
2
https://blog.mint.com/goals/play-your-way-to-financial-security-with-gamification-072012/#comments
3
http://mashable.com/2012/03/27/recyclebank/#.aqinhcGesqV
4
https://blog.captainup.com/analysis-of-linkedin-driving-engagement-with-gamification/
5
http://www.dqindia.com/how-much-dowry-are-you-worth-shaadi-com-uses-unique-gamification-approach-to-tackle-dowry-deaths/
6
http://www.mindbloom.com/proof
7
Health, M., & Spring, S. (2014). LET. Marketing Health Services, 24–28.
8
http://researchaccess.com/2011/08/mcdonald%E2%80%99s-the-masters-of-gamification/

literature. Now, if we observe the applications, it can be said that gamification is being used as a
tool not only for engagement of the users but much beyond that. In Table 2, in addition to enhancing
engagement, it can be seen that organizations are using gamified applications to improve other
internal organizational process like skill development through increased participation in training
programs, driving employees to deliver better performance and for recruitment purposes as well. In
Table 3, apart from customer engagement, other behavioral outcomes expected to be achieved include
brand loyalty, brand development, customer participation and social awareness. Hence, it can be
said that there is a gap between theoretical base and applications of gamification, as the theoretical

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foundations, discussed earlier in the paper, mostly include motivational theories while the applications
of gamification go beyond that scope and highlight other significant process improvements possible
through gamification. The possible reason for this gap is that the academic literature on the subject
is in its early development stage and in the process of widening further.

CONCLUSION

Gamification is an emerging HR and marketing technology trend with a significant potential. The
concept has been picking up pace from 2010 onwards and is popular among the sectors of industry.
With increasing number of research studies on the concept, it is gaining importance in academia as
well. Gamification tends to exploit the inherent human desires for competition, achievement, status,
self-expression, altruism and closure by applying game mechanics of points, levels, challenges, virtual
goods and spaces and leaderboards. The most successful applications of gamification are considered
to be Nike+ and Foursquare that helped in establishing gamification as a way to drive engagement
(Deterding, 2012). The concept is being applied across several industries including healthcare,
information technology, e-commerce, entertainment, education and others with an aim to achieve
organizational outcomes like employee and customer engagement, learning and development, improved
employee performance, recruitment, brand loyalty, brand development, customer participation and
social awareness as well. However, there is a need to expand and build a strong theoretical base for
the concept so as to realize its full potential in academia as well as in industry. Further, there is a
need to address the lack of understanding of building a game design coherent with the desirable
organizational outcome to avoid failures, thus making it essential to apply correct game design so as
to achieve a transformational outcome.

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Gomathi S. has obtained a doctoral degree in the field of Human Resource management in 1994 at a very young
age from Alagappa University, Karaikudi, Tamilnadu as a first full time research scholar. She was born on April 9th,
1966 in Tiruchirapalli. She was the first one to receive the stipend for her Ph.D. programme based on merit competing
over 400 candidates. At present, she has 25 years of teaching experience, inclusive of 23 years of teaching P.G.
students. She made an active contribution in creating four doctorate candidates successfully enhancing her research
contribution. At present, she is guiding six Ph.D. scholars at VITBS. She is a popular and friendly speaker, trainer
in most of the premier educational Institutions and corporates and in other Public forums. She is specialized in
stress management techniques, emotional intelligence, HR analytics, Knowledge management, Balanced score
card, entrepreneurship and other Organisational behaviour & HRM Subjects. As academic achievement, she has
authored t four books one on essentials of Entrepreneurship in 2003, A study on Grievance management in a
Pvt. enterprise in 2014, Impact of social network on employee Productivity and Managing Human resources in an
Organisation in 2016.She is also a recipient of lot of honors as best teacher, best paper presenter in conferences
and also research awards continuously for more than 7 years. She is a recipient of Senior Woman Educator and
Scholar Award from National foundation of entrepreneurship development, Coimbatore on 8th March, 2014. She is
also a recipient of an Award on the International women’s day for the contribution made to Science and Engineering
in VIT, University, Vellore on 9th march, 2015. Guided more than 300 projects in MBA and other mini projects of
Interest. Completed a consultancy project for ITCOT in 1999 and as a single individual organised an AICTE Staff
development programme for other engineering colleges in Tamilnadu which was sponsored by AICTE in 2004.Yet
another achievement, at a very young age she also served as the head of the department for in the Department
of Management studies in Vellore Institute of Technology in the academic year 2004-2005. She had delivered
more than 72 Guest lectures and also presided as a resource person for UGC Sponsored conference and other
national conferences. She has visited countries like Malaysia and Singapore in 1993.

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