Of course you know about the rapid growth of the series of Facebook-based games Farmville, CityVille, and the like. Some estimates indicate as many as 250 million people play one of the ‘Ville’-style social games.

With so many people, across all demographic groups, engaging in these massively popular games online, it only makes sense for organizations that are facing recruiting challenges to look for opportunities to use these gaming concepts in their recruiting and candidate engagement efforts.

The Germany-based industrial company Siemens is one such company that is experimenting with games, at least in part as a recruiting vehicle. Specifically, Siemens has developed an online interactive game called ‘Plantville’, that gives players the opportunity and challenge of running a virtual factory, complete with evaluation of key performance indicators, allocation of scarce capital funds, and the ability to improve process efficiency with the purchase and installation of (naturally) more Siemens equipment. Factory managers in Plantville have to hire and deploy workers, balance worker safety and satisfaction against production delivery schedules, and continuously adapt strategies to changing external conditions.

It actually sounds like a fun game, in a geeky kind of way. keep reading…