This week, I was in my CEO peer group — one of those rare spaces where leaders tell the truth without sugarcoating it.
One of the members, the CEO of a large financial institution, shared a moment that made the whole room pause.
His HR team had just presented a proposal to the executive team. Currently, they have an online system that delivers mandatory compliance training — your standard box-checking software.
Nothing exciting. Definitely not memorable. But it gets the job done, technically.
So, the HR team wanted to take it a step further.
They suggested adding leadership training to the platform — modules, online lessons, maybe even some video content. In their minds, it was progress. More development, more access, more options.
They finished the presentation, thanked the execs for their time, and left the room.
And then, as the CEO in my group told us:
“The second they walked out, my entire executive team turned and looked at me and said — ‘We’re not doing that. We’re already stuck doing the compliance stuff. We’re not adding more of this sh*t."
It wasn’t said with malice. It wasn’t resistance to leadership development.
It was resistance to more of the same — another layer of lifeless, check-the-box content stacked on top of an already disengaging system.
Adding more isn’t the solution. Adding different is.
For HR teams, the instinct makes sense:
“We already have this system. Let’s just load more into it.”
It feels efficient. Familiar. Low lift. Easy.
But if the current system is already dead on arrival — if employees click through it while checking their email — why would you expect better results by simply adding more to it?
That’s not development. That’s digital noise.
And leadership knows it. That’s why the reaction in that boardroom wasn’t just a no — it was a hell no.
Most corporate training (especially online) fails for three reasons:
It’s passive. Watch, click, repeat.
It’s forgettable. No emotion, no stakes, no memory.
It’s disconnected. It doesn’t feel relevant to the learner’s real world.
Even great content can fall flat if the delivery method sucks.
That’s where gamification changes everything.
Gamified training transforms the what into the how people actually want to engage.
Here’s what it does differently:
It activates the brain. Dopamine, motivation loops, and challenge-response mechanics turn passive observers into active participants.
It’s memorable. Storylines, scenarios, and consequences make lessons stick — emotionally and cognitively.
It creates safe space to practice. Real decisions, real feedback, no real-world risk. Behavior change happens here.
It earns respect. Especially from execs who don’t want fluff — but love a smart, strategic challenge.
Imagine that same HR team came in with a different pitch.
They didn’t ask to “add leadership content.”
They said: “We want to run a live leadership simulation that takes 90 minutes and reveals who your real problem-solvers are under pressure.”
You’d have execs leaning in, not checking out.
The truth is: leadership doesn’t hate training. They hate wasted time.
Give them something that challenges them, engages them, and delivers ROI — and they’ll be the ones asking for more.
The takeaway from that boardroom wasn’t just “no more training.”
It was a wake-up call.
Easy isn’t effective.
More isn’t memorable.
And adding new content to a dead system isn’t leadership — it’s digital clutter.
If you want behavior change, build something worth engaging in.
Gamification doesn’t just make training better. It makes it matter.
Want help building a training experience your executive team will actually say yes to? I’ve got some ideas — and a game or two that might surprise you.
Let’s make training the thing they talk about after the meeting — in a good way.