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This is our small tribute to a former guest, Michael Sutton who was on during our first year, as we recently got news that he has passed away.
If you want to hear a bit more from him, here’s an episode where I was leading a panel that Michael was a part of.
Our condolences to Michael’s family and closest ones.
Rob
Full episode transcription (AI Generated)
Rob:
Hey, engagers. So today we will have a very different type of episode. We did something slightly similar when Professor Mihai Chiksa Mihai passed away, but this time, it’s another fellow member of the gamification game based learning community that is no longer among us. In this case, it’s Michael Sutton. In different from our previous episode with Dr.
Rob:
Mihai, I did get the fantastic opportunity to meet Michael Sutton. I don’t get to meet many of the guests in person, but I did have the privilege, thanks to international conference on business learning games that happened in Lisbon. I believe this must have been in 2019, to get to meet this fantastic character, Michael Sutton. And I regret to inform those of you who are not aware that he’s no longer among us. He has passed away.
Rob:
He survived by his wife, which is the one that gave the news to an institute to which we both. Well, he used to belong to. I still do, which is the business excellence institute. We’re the ones who passed on the news and the very sad news, I have to say. But I’d like to invest this small, let’s call it celebration, to what his legacy can be.
Rob:
I don’t want to dedicate it to the very sad news of his passing, which happened last year, late last year, in December. I want to dedicate it to many of the things that he did do. He did a PhD in a stage that many would call later in life. He was 50 something when he completed his phd. So by most standards, you would consider that’s not the typical PhD.
Rob:
He went sort of against the current, in many ways, in academia, us in game based learning. It’s not the typical thing to use game based learning, to use gamification. And he did find quite a bit of resistance, I have to say, as an adjunct professor, which is what I tend to do, I’m sort of a bit more of. I come here, I teach a bit, but I’m not a full time professor in any of the places I teach. I don’t live, so to speak, in those institutions day to day.
Rob:
So I haven’t found the same resistance. But apparently, and by his own accounts, he did encounter some of this. But I’m sure that the way that this sort of passed through and the way he got to do the amazing job and the work that he leaves us with is precisely by showing how this actually does work. What are the good things of implementing these kinds of strategies? And instead of preaching with the word, who’s preaching with actions and results?
Rob:
So I think that’s a significant part of the things that he might be leaving behind for many of us who are definitely going to continue down this path, and I know many more will be joining in the future. Again, as I’ve mentioned many times, intentionally or unintendedly, hopefully most will be intentionally so that you can make the best out of these opportunities. But yeah, I think he leaves many examples. There is an episode, he was a guest, again, contrary to what we had with Professor Mihai, which is a dream of mine, to have him on the podcast. Michael Sutton did participate on the podcast.
Rob:
If you go to professorgame.com, you will find all the details of what I’m discussing right now there. But you can also definitely just click on the search bar, type down Sutton with Double T, and you will find his episode right there. It’s episode 31. It’s one of the first episodes that we had, if that makes any sense. It was in the first year still of our podcast.
Rob:
I met him sometime later. As I said, I think it was 2019, late 2019, if I’m not mistaken. It was early fall or late summer, I believe, in Lisbon. Many thanks, by the way, to the people of the international conference on business learning games for that opportunity, that invitation that gave me, among other things, the chance to get to meet him and others in person. So once again, a small tribute celebration to his life.
Rob:
Thank you, Michael, for everything that you have done for this world of game based learning, gamification and whatnot. Thank you for the life of legacy, for everything you’ve done, and definitely our condolences to all of your family members and everybody who was near and dear to you. Once again, thank you very much for all of that. And it’s hard times for people when this happens. But let’s try to focus on the good, the great things that you left, on the legacy that you’ve left for your loved ones, both as a person and as a professional that you were.
Rob:
And thanks again. It was fantastic having you on the podcast. Thank you for that. It was fantastic as well to having met you in person. One of the quotes that they mentioned is that when you were with him, when you were seen with Michael, you were usually seen laughing.
Rob:
So let’s laugh in his name and pay the small tribute. So thank you again, Michael. Thank you, engagers, for listening in and, yeah, that’s it. Thank you very much. And I’ll see you.
Rob:
We’ll talk again next week with another of our fantastic future guests. Thanks again, Michael. Thanks for everything.
End of transcription
