Do Students Trained Using Serious Games Become Better Sales Representatives? An Experiment to Study the Performance of Academic Serious Games

This paper analyzes the potential of serious games for professional and pedagogical purposes and learning. To do this, the authors have questioned the efficiency of these games. They present an experiment conducted with 66 students trained in sales that compares a group of players with a group of non-players. The game’s impact on skills was studied from two angles: first from a theoretical point of view (based on the marks obtained in tests), and second from a practical point of view (based on professional situations). The responses for continuous variables (the marks) were measured depending on the two control factors (the type of training and past sales experience) and could each take two forms: on the one hand, the learning method (serious game group or test group) or on the other hand, depend on the past sales experience (with sales experience or without sales experience). As the level of experience was not identical in each of the four configurations, we found we were in a two-factor ANOVA configuration and followed an unbalanced plan. Whereas the results show that the serious game has a weak potential for students who are inexperienced in the field, they also underscore the fact that the game has a very positive effect on learners who are already experienced in sales. The serious game could therefore act as a booster. The authors have then highlighted the potential side effects of these learning tools, such as the formatting of profiles or the “Disneylandization” of business. To avoid this, they suggest the trainer’s contextualizing role be reinforced.