ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Gamify is the product of a team effort over a few years, starting with Nick Gall’s thought leadership on emergent systems and design thinking which formed an essential base to the development of many of the ideas in the book. My early research on gamification developed with collaboration from Mary Mesaglio, whose expertise on innovation management was essential, and Brian Blau, who provided invaluable insights into the world of game development.

Gartner’s gamification research got a tremendous boost in 2011 with the support of the Gartner Fellows, in particular Tom Austin, Mark Raskino, Jackie Fenn, and Dave Aron, who provided the early support for developing the research topic under Gartner’s Maverick Research Program. In 2012, David Willis and Betsy Burton were instrumental in supporting the development of a Gartner Special Report on gamification, with contributions from Rita Sallam, Jarod Greene, Cameron Haight, Chris Wilson, Elise Olding, Thomas Otter, Whit Andrews, Kevin Sterneckert, Steven Leigh, Don Scheibenreif, Simon Mingay, and Chet Geschickter which built out the research area.

Beyond research, Gamify was supported by a tremendous group of people including Andrew Spender, who sponsored the book at Gartner. While I have written research for many years, writing a book is quite a different project, and Heather Pemberton Levy from Gartner Books provided me with fantastic guidance and support in polishing the manuscript throughout its development. From the beginning, Gamify was a joint project with our publisher, Bibliomotion, and benefitted from the contributions of many people on the Bibliomotion team, particularly the founders, Erika Heilman and Jill Friedlander, who were reliable and supportive partners throughout the project.

Gamify would not have been possible without the support of my management team including Philip Allega, Anthony Bradley, and Peter Sondergaard, who helped to carve out the time and deflect the distractions which enabled me to write a book. Early reviewers included many of the aforementioned Gartner analysts, and also I’d like to thank Bernardo Crespo Velasco from BBVA, John Gehl from the Subway restaurant organization, and Nikola Ristivojevich from Ford Motor Company for their insightful reviews. The graphics in Gamify were improved tremendously thanks to the guidance and insights of Glenn Thode and Monica Virag.

My goal in Gamify was to ground the book in reality, highlight best practices in gamification and to leverage the knowledge of successful organizations. That was made possible with the collaboration of gamification practitioners from the many organizations that are highlighted in the book, including Cami Thompson, Clayton Nicholas, Cory Eisentraut, Craig Kielburger, David Cotterill, Dr. Jennifer Stinson, Imran Sayeed, Jill Schnarr, Naureen Meraj, Paul Wilmore, Rod Morris, Russell Bacon, Salman Khan, Stuart Thom, and Sven Gerjets.

Finally, but perhaps most importantly I thank my family, Yolanda, Geoff, and Shannon, who supported my disappearance for many hours of writing including countless lost evenings, weekends, and holidays. And the list would not be complete without my hound Gringo, who patiently listened to my ideas and kept me company in the middle of the night.