Rob Alvarez Bucholska
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Bhaskar Thyagarajan Is Inspired by the Classic Games | Episode 331

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Bhaskar Thyagarajan is the Founder & CEO of BlueSky Learning | KAIROS. BlueSky Learning is a consulting & training company with a vision of helping individuals, teams and organizations
nurture and develop their Human skills. All programs are anchored in the experiential learning methodology. Kairos is a platform offering digital and in-person games & activities to the L&D community.

They have been designing game-based learning modules with a focus on behavioral skills for 2 decades. Bhaskar is a facilitator, speaker and mentor focused on building institutional capability in game-based learning. He has trained over 400 trainers in facilitating experiential & game-based workshops, designed 30+ unique workshop designs, 100+ game-based learning modules and has rich experience of working with professionals across 30+ countries.

He is also a founding member and Senior advisor at Koach.ai – a conversational AI-based coaching and mentoring app focused on youth and frontline employees.

 

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Full episode transcription (AI Generated)

Rob:
Subscribe engagers. Welcome back to the Professor Game podcast and those of you who are joining for the first time, welcome. Definitely. As well, we have a special guest with us today. We have Basket Bhaskar.

Rob:
Are you prepared to engage?

Bhaskar:
Bring it on, Rob. I’m ready. Let’s play.

Rob:
And I hope I’m pronouncing your name and last name. I don’t know if. Well, but at least decently. Let’s give it a shot. So, Basket Tiagarayan, is that moderately.

Bhaskar:
Yeah, you got it right. Except that the j is pronounced as.

Rob:
Too bad. So. He’s the founder and CEO of Blue Sky Learning in Cairo’s Blue Sky Learning is a consulting and training company with a vision of helping individuals, teams and organizations nurture and develop their human skills. Our programs are anchored in experiential learning technology. As you know, that is what we do.

Rob:
And Kairos is a platform for offering digital and in person games and activities in the LND community. They have been designing game based learning modules with a focus on behavioral skills for two decades. Basket is a facilitator, a speaker and a mentor focused on building institutional capability with game based learning. And he has trained over 400 trainers in facilitating experiential and game based workshops, designed over 30 unique workshop designs, over 100 game based learning modules, and has a rich experience of working with professionals across over 30 countries. He’s also a founding member and a senior advisor at Coach AI, which is a conversational AI based coaching and mentoring app focused on youth and frontline employees.

Rob:
So, basketball, is there anything that we need to say before we start asking you any questions?

Bhaskar:
No, that’s good, Rob. You’ve been kind, and I’m ready.

Rob:
Let’s do this, because.

Bhaskar:
Sorry, before I actually have to, I do have something to say, which is that I want to start with acknowledging what you do, Rob. There are very few people who are as dedicated and as long term, and I was checking last time, you’ve crossed 300 episodes. So I want to start by acknowledging the work you do and the selfless giving that you’re doing in this space, which is so niche, and it takes a lot of work and time in the middle of 20 other things you do so good on. You keep doing your great work, Rob.

Rob:
Thank you very much. You are too kind. You are too kind. So, basket, we would like to know, what does a day with you look like? What does it feel like?

Rob:
What are you doing these days? If we were you, how would it look like?

Bhaskar:
Oh, man. Sometimes I wish you were not me. But I actually have now, over time, started looking at my day as two parts, and I think that’s the only way I can make any sense of it. So I’ve divided my day into the fix and the fluid. So saying that there are some parts which have to be fixed, which have to be ritualized.

Bhaskar:
So I wake up at 5530, and I definitely at least five days a week, exercise without fail, irrespective of where I am, irrespective of what form that exercise takes. And I’ve recently, over the last maybe a year or so, started seeing the power and value of meditation, especially for people like us who are in different zones, in different mind spaces, 20 times a day, and I have the same meditation ritual before I go to bed for about ten minutes. So these are the fixed parts, and everything else in the middle is extremely fluid. As you mentioned, I run two companies. One is fairly old, it’s been about two decades, but it’s a consulting and training company, so the needs of that organization are different.

Bhaskar:
The other is a technology company, and technology is new to me. Well, the startup is about 16 months old, and our platform is about four months old. Since it’s completely launched, and that has its different challenges and requirements, I need to switch from a seasoned veteran to a startup founder mode and wear multiple caps multiple times a day. A travel is an integral part, as it is yours. So I end up traveling, maybe in a good month.

Bhaskar:
When I say good, I mean from a good business month, maybe 20 days a month, and then it disrupts the other things. So anywhere between ten to 20 days a month, I end up traveling, and therefore travel disrupts the schedule. So in those days, the schedules look different. I also teach at a couple of business schools like you. So actually, if you heard of Gary Vaynerchuk, who’s a big guy on social media, he runs his own company, spoke about something that stuck with me, which is about clouds and dust, and say that as entrepreneurs, especially in the knowledge space, you kind of have to be in the clouds.

Bhaskar:
Think about strategic things, where things are going, the big picture, long term plans, and at the same time deal with the dust, which is the execution, the day to day elements, and keep going between the clouds and dust many times in the day. Some days are very intense. When we are in design phase, when we’re designing a new game, or we’re working on a program design, then those days tend to be different. So my days are really fluid in most parts, with some parts being ritualized and fixed.

Rob:
That looks amazing. And very, as you were saying, it does seem like sometimes it breaks, but you still have that structure. I miss a little bit of that structure. Now that we have a one year old at home, structure is gone.

Bhaskar:
I can imagine the window in many ways. I know my daughter is 14, so I’m well past that time, but I can remember those. And it’s funny because you enjoy those days five years later when you think about it, not at the time when you’re going through it.

Rob:
Absolutely. And don’t get me wrong, I’m enjoying it like crazy. But it’s funny how they ask you to give her a lot of structure, right? Eating her meals at the same time, taking her naps and going to sleep more or less at the same time, and waking up at the same time, da da da, which we definitely do. But then it’s funny how even managing to do that, you would expect your life would also be super structured.

Rob:
It’s the exact opposite. To manage to do that, you have to change things around constantly. So that’s something I found interesting, at least in many ways. So thank you very much for that, Basker, and let’s dive into a question we really enjoy. And I’m sure since you’ve heard the podcast, I’m sure you’ve enjoyed listening to do.

Rob:
I do, and hopefully you will enjoy answering it just as much. And it has to do with fail or first attempts in learning. So, Bhaskar, can you give us a story about one of your first attempts in learning, or maybe your favorite one where you wanted to go north, things went south? I don’t know. We want to be there with you and take some of those lessons.

Bhaskar:
Oh yes. I mean, if you don’t keep learning, you never grow. So I mean, some of the best learning insights, I’m sure you’ll agree, come from the failures that we experience. I mean, I remember going back, I’ve been facilitating game based learning sessions, designing workshops for about almost two decades now. And this story has stayed with me for many, many years, and it’s impacted my design in a big way.

Bhaskar:
Where in my early years, I designed a session. This was for the salespeople of an insurance company in India. And insurance is like in most parts of the world, an extremely cutthroat business. It’s doggy dog. It’s not what it should be, but it’s the way the business runs.

Bhaskar:
And I designed a whole workshop around. The idea was to how do you get into the mind of your customer, since a lot of it is relationship based, one on one selling in insurance, and most game based design workshops work on getting people to experience something and designed in a manner that their natural proclivity, their natural tendencies, play themselves out and they’re able to see the impact of those natural tendencies in the outcome in the game. But because it’s a game, it’s a safe space where failure doesn’t have consequences. And the more you actually experience failure, the more you actually learn. But one of the things I did was I invited the leader of the team to come and share his perspective.

Bhaskar:
What I didn’t do, and this is where the fail was to truly understand the motivations and the personality of the leader, which is very essential when you are designing and delivering, to set the expectations right and create some boundaries, which is what I learned, which was the mistake I did, which I didn’t do. And what I realized was slowly but steadily, the leader was using the fails in the game of the participants to reinforce his own beliefs and perceptions, and really spoke down to the team and told them about how this is what he thought about the team and it played itself out in the game. And his idea was to be that Alpha rather than he thought he would push the team by fear as opposed to motivate the team. And my learning at that time was how any game design, or any game based learning design, we have to focus a lot on psychological safety and how calling out people or how you design for when the team chooses wrong, or to all games have points of choices. So while you design for the positive point of choice, positive side, you also have to design for what will they experience and how do you facilitate when they choose the wrong side and how you are able to bring it out in a very safe.

Bhaskar:
How do you create that safe space for exploration and learning was a big, big learning very early in my journey as a game based learning designer. So I really embraced the concept of mirrors and windows, saying that any germ experience should first present a mirror so that people are able to reflect from so where am I? And then slowly take them to the window of what can be. So the idea of safety and the idea of mirrors and windows has stuck with me. I was deeply affected by that experience because I felt terrible about providing the platform to this leader when I should have done my homework to understand the motivations and the personality of the leader of the team.

Bhaskar:
That was one. And if I can talk about one more, we can do a whole podcast.

Rob:
Sure. We’re always all into experiences, for sure.

Bhaskar:
Yeah, I can do a whole podcast only on worst experiences, because over 20 years they’ve been many. I was listening to what Monica Cornetti and I also love her stuff and we’ve done some work together. So she was talking about gamification in event apps. I remember from that episode as a learner, when I went into some of these mood platforms, whether it’s LinkedIn learning or coursera, there seems to be a tendency to use gamification as a fad or as a metoo, and the rewards are just too easy. And there’s a reward for everything, which finally makes the entire reward process totally meaningless.

Bhaskar:
And so I find that to be now a trend, especially for those who are getting into. While my first experience was about games in learning, the second is about gamification. And I feel that anytime the value, if you’re able to attach value to a reward where a person has to stretch themselves in some way, where they are able to operate from that stretch zone, that’s when the gamification really is powerful. And so to me as a learner, that gamification did not make any sense to me and it did not work. And when the answer is too obvious and the reward.

Bhaskar:
So if there are option a, B, and C and B and C are so bad that even without reading the content, you know that a is the right answer and there are 20 of them. Whatever gamification you build around them, since there is no challenge involved, there is no joy attached. And this is something, in spite of it being so obvious. I find it time and again, even in LMS platforms, that many of our clients use the content that’s put out there. The gamification seems to be more a badge or a tick mark, saying, we also offer gamification.

Bhaskar:
So neither is the client demanding enough or understands the value that gamification can bring. And the service provider is able to get away with it because they have ticked the box. So, I mean, these are just a couple of examples that really came to my mind.

Rob:
Good examples. The second one, I would have to say, of course, by seeing this from the outside, and don’t get me wrong, I do this all the time. Like I’m analyzing apps, especially when we’re in a learning situation. The students, they get to analyze from the outside because they haven’t designed something themselves yet. And it’s a good learning situation for most, but it’s not what you experienced, and it’s always different.

Rob:
There are many things that you don’t see when you’re on the inside. And when you experience it and telling that story, it always helps to understand because sometimes you see and you say oh, they should have done this, should have done that. But when you hear the story, it’s like, oh, so that’s why they did this and they did that instead of this thing. That for me was obvious and that’s super helpful when helping other people. But anyways, good stories.

Rob:
Thank you very much for those experiences. Bhaskar, let’s actually go for a big win for you. Time when things actually did go well and you want to, I don’t know, tell us some of what were those success factors. We want to be there with you again.

Bhaskar:
Yeah, happy to share. I mean, we’ve had the good fortune of very rich experience of multitude of clients working with us over time, and we got a chance to solve some tough problems, put ourselves in that stretch zone. So a couple of them that strike me was something closer to in terms of history, just in the last couple of years we work with a communications client. I can talk about the client, a company called Tata Communications, which is a global communication technology company. It’s based out of India, but they operate in over 60 geographies.

Bhaskar:
So we ran a unique.

Rob:
And Tata is huge. Not only that’s one of their divisions, which is correct, immense, but they’re huge.

Bhaskar:
Yeah. They have over 400 companies and God knows how many trillion dollars in terms of market capitalization across their companies. We work with many of the Tata companies, but this one stuck with me because they have a very unique. Tata as an organization, is very strong on CSR, corporate social responsibility, a big, big part. It’s a very strategic to the organization.

Bhaskar:
It’s ingrained in their value system. So Tata communication runs organization wide volunteering program and they run all through the year, but they have one week, which is called the volunteering week, where all employees, all, I think 17,000 of them or 20,000 of them have to give 4 hours to volunteering in that one week. It’s a tools down volunteering week. So it’s a massive experience. And the CSR team recruits volunteer leaders to help them execute this project.

Bhaskar:
We came in to build core leadership skills in these volunteer leaders because the role that they fulfill has all the elements that leadership competence, all the competencies they require to deliver on their role as volunteer leader are leadership competencies. And we’ve been running this for about four years successfully. And it’s called the Waves Workshop. And before the pandemic, we used to run it primarily as an in person workshop. So while they had volunteers around the world, the program was restricted to India because that’s where we were.

Bhaskar:
And the international audience was spread everywhere. In each zone, there would be one or two volunteers, so it wasn’t really possible to design something for them. And all their sessions were anchored in game based learning. So all the leadership competencies were deconstructed using game based learning design. And when we all moved to the virtual world, the big problem was, how do we?

Bhaskar:
And the whole game based learning. This leadership workshop had become so popular that they attached learning credits to this program. So anybody who attended this program got a fairly large number of credits as part of their learning journey in the organization. Instead of people just looking at volunteers wanting to join this workshop, people would become volunteers so that they could attend this workshop. So it had a lot of pull value.

Bhaskar:
But when the pandemic hit, we were struck, how do we drive this entire experience virtually, and how do we stay true to our game based learning design? And so where the problem became an opportunity was because it was virtual. Now it was open to everyone around the world. So we ended up having a cohort of 190 volunteer leaders from 40 countries around the globe. And we had to run it in two time zones, one for GMT plus and one for GMT minus.

Bhaskar:
And the entire program was designed as bite sized workshops so that people can come attend the workshop and go back to their work. So it became a six week certification program and entirely anchored in game based learning. So we were forced to actually design games to suit those leadership competencies. And at that time, Kydos as a platform was not ready. In fact, a lot of the games that we built scratch versions of for that workshop became the genesis for Kairos as a platform where a whole universe of leadership and behavioral competencies could be driven by core behavioral games.

Bhaskar:
And that became really the starting point for even building this entire bouquet of behavioral games that you could conduct as part of virtual workshops. So that is an example that we’re very proud of, and we’re very thankful for that. We face that problem because from that problem is where an entire category of games, an entire rich portfolio of digital games for behavioral skills, really took birth during that session.

Rob:
Sounds like an amazing experience, for sure. And, Bhaskar, with all this experience that you have, can you give us a gist of what your process for building these experiences looks like? If a client comes in, you have to build something. How do you do it? Essentially?

Bhaskar:
Sure. So we actually break it up into two parts. Rob, the first part, which I think is, and you’ve spoken about it many times, so have some of your guests, which is really to understand the need in granularity and understand the need, not just from one person’s perspective, but from all the stakeholders in that particular requirement. So we start with a very simple why who what, how process. So we start with why this need?

Bhaskar:
Where is this need coming from? What is the origin story of this need, of this program? And it could be as simple as saying we have a whole batch of engineering trainees who are joining us from campuses and they’re jumping into a corporate world. And therefore, what are those core skills that they need beyond their technical knowledge to transition into a corporate world? Very well.

Bhaskar:
It could be something like that or a fairly generic need, or it could be something very specific about, like recently we did for a leadership team, a very complex program for the leadership team of an r and D function, for an automobile organization, which was in a big design transition phase. And so they’d got people from ten different countries reporting into an indian head, and people who are coming in were subject matter experts, but didn’t really have the understanding of how to integrate with a multicultural leadership team. So they’re both workshops, but they’re both diametrically opposite as needs. So the why is this critical question? Second is, who is the audience?

Bhaskar:
A deep understanding of the audience, which also you’ve spoken about before, several times. And the third really is the what? Question. So what is an important question, which is that what will success look like after this workshop is over? What will the change be visible?

Bhaskar:
So then what happens is you’re not building for competencies. You’re building a program for the behavioral change that you want to experience as a result of those competencies. So that’s a critical part for us because our design is dependent on it. And I’ll come to that last, of course, is the how, which is the mechanics. Is it going to be in person?

Bhaskar:
Is it going to be virtual? Is it going to be in a classroom? Is it physical? What are the logistics associated with this program? And I’m talking specific to programs which are instructor led.

Bhaskar:
And when it’s a self paced learning design, it’s a different model, but the elements don’t change. So once we’ve understood that, we move to stage two, which is the design of the program itself, and we break down the entire program into sessions or elements that we want to cover. And then we start with the what, which is the what for us is what is the. Because we’re a game based learning company, everything is anchored in game based learning. We say, what is the experience that will really bring out the elements associated with that competency?

Bhaskar:
So one of the key elements is collaboration. What is the game design? What is the perfect game? Or what is the right game that we can use so that the typical dysfunctions associated with collaboration, or the blind spots that we are not aware of, that result in not collaborating will come out. So the, what is really the experience?

Bhaskar:
So there, the rule we use is design a game that has finite sets of rules, but has infinite outcomes, which means that anything can happen in the game. And what happens in the game has got completely to do with the dynamics of the group itself. And so it’s a very open model as opposed to a closed design. And then second comes the part which is so what? So there’s what?

Bhaskar:
There’s so what? There’s now what? And then what? So that’s the design that we follow. So the so what is gone through this experience happened in the game?

Bhaskar:
And how do you facilitate a learning discussion in a safe and appreciative inquiry manner that allows you to get people to reflect in the game itself? What did I do in the game and how did that impact the outcome? How did I impact others? So what happened in the game and how did it impact that outcome? And you still stay with the game.

Bhaskar:
The third part of the design is the now what. So what does this, therefore, how does all this relate to my role, my job, my function? And therefore, you can take the same game experience, but make it contextual. For a young engineer joining an organization, then the context is different. Or a senior r and D engineer who is part of a leadership team.

Bhaskar:
So the now water is where you move from generic to context. And the last part is where the most critical, which we’ve now integrated as a part of all of our learning resources, even on the Kairos platform, we built any game that one uses, they will find answer for all four, which means as a facilitator, you will have all the resources to take them down. To say that behavior is not about knowledge, but is about change. And therefore, then what are the set of actions and rituals that they will commit to take that reflection and convert it into habit change? So essentially, this is the design that we follow.

Bhaskar:
There is a part which is understanding the need, and there is the part which then converts that into a program design. But really go from deep design thinking around the user expectations of all stakeholders. It’s not just the learner, especially in the corporate space, and going down to saying, what is the rituals or habit change that I need to commit as a new individual or as a team that will create that behavioral change? So that’s really a design, rob, that we follow for most of our program designs.

Rob:
Sounds absolutely amazing. Thank you very much for that detailed account, basket. Not at all, not at all. It’s very detailed, and that’s something that we tend to enjoy. So thank you, actually for that.

Rob:
Thank you very much, basket. It’s very kind of you sharing all this so very quickly. A small thing that we would ask for you, is there any best practice, anything that you would say, well, if you do this, at least your gamification project will be a little bit better.

Bhaskar:
So I think the main thing is to understand, to not get caught up specific to game design one, not get caught up in the game. Not get caught up in the bells and whistles. First, understand that the game is not the end. The game is a means. The end is what you want the participants to take away or experience, or reflect on or act upon.

Bhaskar:
And the game is essentially a catalyst. So more than being as designers, we can get very easily lost in the creativity or the design or the purity of our own game experience. But remember that we live the games or we live our tools, but the participants. For them, it’s a one time experience and it’s a means to an end. So one advice really is, while this is the bread and butter, this is not the end outcome that learner is looking for.

Bhaskar:
So once you do that, you then start make it more about less about knowledge and more about application. You make it less generic and more specific to that individual. So that is really for me. I know it doesn’t talk specifically about design, but I think there are enough tools and training that’s available for you to get good at game design. Or even if you don’t want to design, there are a lot of tools and games readily available that you can use.

Bhaskar:
But the part that you cannot outsource or depend on others is that deep thinking around saying, what is the end that I want? And then choose the game or the experience after. So that’s a best practice, I think, to inculcate upfront and early. If somebody’s getting into this for the.

Rob:
First, it’s super, super crucial and important. So, Bhaskar, after hearing some of the interviews that you have already of the podcast, and after hearing yourself as well, being asked these questions, is there somebody that you would like to hear answering these questions, somebody that makes you curious? Maybe a personal favorite of somebody you’d like to hear on the podcast?

Bhaskar:
I’m going to take two routes to this, Rob. One is a very selfish need, and two is please do have something that’s a different side that if you can get, and if I can help in any way. Let me start with the selfish part. I’m more old school when it comes to games. Honestly, I’m not very big on Nintendo or Xbox or Wii.

Bhaskar:
I’m more old school when it comes to games. So I would love to have Alexey Pajitnov, the founder of Tetris. I don’t know if you’ve heard, he’s a very reclusive guy apparently, but it’s fascinating, his story of how he came upon Tetris and how that game and I play on most days when I’m traveling, I try and play a round of Tetris before I go to bed. And of course the other person, he’s quite old, but I keep reading about him, is Milton Bradley, the founder of Battleship, the game that you can play from when you’re ten to however old you are. I’m a big fan of old games that are enduring and haven’t lost their relevance in all these years.

Bhaskar:
So these are two guides that I would love to have on the podcast. The other side that I wanted to really look at is it would be really nice if you can invite people from the other side, which is companies, institutions who want game based learning or have executed game based learning in their organizations and really understand user insights, problems, expectation management constraints. So how can we. Game based learning is at its inflection point. I mean, it’s not that fringe movement anymore, but at the same time, it’s not really as big as it can be.

Bhaskar:
And part of the reason is ignorance, half information, or a lot of doubt and fear associated with implementing something new. So if we can get people who have executed it in their organizations and understand how they went about it, I think as designers and organizations, it will give us a lot of inputs on, therefore, how to present and how to look at those friction points and how can make the process frictionless.

Rob:
Amazing. Great recommendations, for sure. How about a book? If you had to recommend one book, which book would it be and why?

Bhaskar:
Okay, so I put three books and I kept saying, how do I make it one book? How do I make it one book? I’m going to talk about one book, and the other two I’ll just mention, right? The book I would really recommend is Hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy. And the reason I say that is at the fundamental the story is a very simple truth, but it gives a lot of insight into how as designers, you can create that alternate world that is fun, funny, outlandish, and yet grounded in real characters.

Bhaskar:
So to me, it was a great insight into game design, into storytelling. So that’s a book I would recommend people, if they have not read, or if you read it, read it with this new lens. Then, of course, some classics that I love are growth, mindset and nudge books that I would recommend that you, even if you reread it.

Rob:
There you go. Vascar. This is a humble, less question. What would you say is your superpower, that thing that you do at least better than most other people out there?

Bhaskar:
Yeah. In your entire list of questions, this is the most awkward one. Rob.

Rob:
I know. I know it is. If they ask me that question or that kind of question when you’re elsewhere, I know it’s uncomfortable, but I also realize how interesting it can be to do that introspection from that perspective of doing I do something I do good, because that’s why I am where I am. What is it? How can I super focus myself on that kind of thing?

Bhaskar:
Sure. I’m only glad that this is not on video, so it’s less awkward. Right. So I would say my superpower is really, I would say empathy. I automatically or instinctively, deeply connect with the learner’s reality or try to connect with the learner’s reality at every instance.

Bhaskar:
So, to me, it’s completely about whom you are impacting and how will this make a difference. And the reason I say this is if you’ve primarily spent your time in the corporate world, in the learning space, and if you’ve done a lot of instructor led training, I’ve recognized that close to 60% to 70% of the people are there not by choice. Many of them actually have other things that they think are important. And if you are able to set your mind saying that this is my playing field, then you start designing for the most disinterested person and understand that they have every reason to be disinterested because of whatever 20 reasons there could be. And therefore, to me, my strength and my MBTI personality is ENFP, and my feeling preference is very strong.

Bhaskar:
And I think my unerring focus on the learner’s reality is, I would say, a superpower that helps me, and a.

Rob:
Super useful one as well at that. So, Bhaskar, you said you’re not big on these late trendy video games and so on, but what would you say is your favorite game? Video game, old game, new game, whatever.

Bhaskar:
That looks, you know, I really like bit. Right now, I’m in an obsessed place. I went through a phase of chess, online chess for a while, Rob. I’m drawn toward games which have the same set of rules, but every game is different. So that’s what really draws my attention.

Bhaskar:
You can even play ludo, and you might have played a million times, but the next Ludo game is so different because of whom you’re playing with and what numbers you’re dealt with. So I love games which have, and that’s integral to our design, also, where the rules are finite. But are you a soccer fan? Football fan, I should say, in Europe, yes.

Rob:
Football, soccer, whatever you want to call it.

Bhaskar:
Yeah. So I also follow football intently. And the reason these sports have lasted so long is because the basic rules of football haven’t changed. Every game is different, the dynamics are different, the people, players. So to me, that’s the reason why I love some of these games.

Rob:
Fantastic. Amazing. Thank you very much for that. And Bhaskar, we are arriving to the end of the podcast. Is there anything else you want to any, I don’t know.

Rob:
You have any call to action anywhere we can find you? Any final piece of advice, whatever you want to go for now is that moment.

Bhaskar:
Sure you can find me. I’m not actually on too many social media platforms, so I’m only on LinkedIn. I am on Twitter, but more as a reader than I’m active. So LinkedIn is a place I’m active. I write regularly on LinkedIn, and I respond quickly on LinkedIn.

Bhaskar:
So that’s a great place to find me. I did have a website of mine, but it’s under reproduction right now. It’s not active. So that’s a place to find me. To me, in terms of advice, or especially people who are on the wall and not sure if they want to dive into game based learning or not, I would say it’s not as easy as it looks, but it’s also not as hard as it seems.

Bhaskar:
The way to start would be to start with the game that you really love and say, what are some things that I’m learning from this game? And that can be your start to game based learning. It’s as simple as that. So the other one is that a personal experience that before the pandemic, we were a completely in person driven training programs and design. So all our games were only in the in person space.

Bhaskar:
But the pandemic gave us the required kick on the backside, where we were completely caught unaware and not ready at all for the virtual world and the digital world. But I think that’s why Carol Dweck growth mindset features so highly in my list because that is the mindset that we had to be to really learn so much about what it takes to make and design games in the digital world. And from being an India oriented company in the last two years, we’ve been fortunate enough to work with people across many, many countries around the globe. And if it wasn’t for that adversity brought on by pandemic, we would not be here. So I think the last bit of advice is if you’re not learning, if you have not consciously put yourself to learn something new, then you’re going to be left behind.

Bhaskar:
Doesn’t matter which.

Rob:
Amazing, amazing. Thank you very much for that bascott. I think it’s very sound advice in that sense. So engagers, let’s take it, let’s take action as well. Let’s dive into this.

Rob:
Let’s start doing, let’s start acting, let’s start winning at every single level basket. Thank you very much for being here. Thank you for that time that you’ve dedicated to us, to the engagers. And engagers, thank you as well for being here. However, as you know, at least for now and for today, it is time to say that it’s game over.

Rob:
Hey, engagers, we have some sponsored content here. It’s one of the very first times that we do this, and it is because this is a podcast. And if you have yourself considered getting into podcasting, I would like to share one of my not so well kept secrets. I use Zencaster to record my episodes. The main feature, at least for me, because I have an interview based podcast, is the fact that the voices of the guest or guests and myself are recorded on separate tracks, you might be asking yourself, why is that relevant?

Rob:
Well, for me it means that when I have to do any edits, for example, if I sneeze, which happens often, especially in spring, I can easily clear that specific part of my speech, which is knees out of the track without affecting whatever the guest it’s saying at the, you know, this is very important. It’s also very easy. I can create a personalized link for every guest, and all we need is a browser for the call to happen. I also know that Zencaster is an all in one solution for podcasting, where you can record, you can edit, you can publish episodes to all major platforms. So whether you are considering podcasting or you are already podcasting and you might want to try this out, you can go to zencaster.com pricing and use my code professorgame, all one word and you’ll get 30% off your first month on any podcaster paid plan.

Rob:
I want you to have the same easy experiences I do for all my podcasting and content needs. It’s time to share your story and engagers once again for listening to the Professor Game podcast and I hope you enjoyed this interview with Basker. Do you have any questions that you would like to ask future guests? You know, something interesting that’s going through your mind that is related to this world of games, inspired solutions, gamification, game based learning, anything along those lines? If you do, go to professorgame.com slash question and ask your question.

Rob:
If it is selected, it’ll come up in a future episode and you will get your answer live during that episode. But remember, besides from asking that question, please do remember before you go on to your next mission to subscribe or follow whatever that looks like on your favorite podcast app. This is absolutely for free. And of course, listen to the next episode of Professor Game. See you there.

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