Employee Experience

This blog has everything you need to discover about ongoing touch points of employee experience including its meaning, importance, and best practices to foster a positive employee experience.

The world of work is fast-flying. So have the ways of the business world, but what always remains immutable is the notion- employees determine the success of your business entity. Organizations today are increasingly understanding the primary need to recognize Manpower out of their 3 Ms (manpower, machinery, money), as their stellar assets. Thanks to the advancement in technology, modernized work options such as freelancing and content creation are gaining popularity among the masses. People today are subjected to a variety of alternatives to yield money and maintain a good standard of living.

Businesses, on the other hand, have assumed that people owe them work to pay their bills. This is indeed untrue. If you categorize your workforce into bad or good enough for your company, you’re on the way to downfall. A happy workplace is one where employees and their feelings are given the topmost priority.

This is the rudimentary principle that business leaders devolve to improve the organization’s overall performance. Even then only 9% of business concerns are ready to accept the underlying importance of employee experience. For an organization to master employee engagement, it must think about the employee journey in a more holistic manner.

Let us first understand the meaning of employee experience before discussing further basics.

What Is Meant by Employee Experience?

Employee Experience (EX) is a literal interpretation of an employee's journey- from the day he joins the office until the time he exits from the company, and everything that lies in between. The employee experience can be categorized based on 4 major segments of the employee lifecycle; they are:

Onboarding/ recruitment- starts with screening and interviewing potential candidates and selecting the one who fits the job description perfectly. Once the chosen candidate gets enlisted, there is room for induction and orientation to familiarise the new hire with the company culture and work ethics.

Pro tip- employee experience will surge, provided you have a smooth Onboarding plan, customized as per the recruit’s requirements.

Related- employee orientation and induction program.

Career development and retention- once the employee is settled down, his job performance will be evaluated and the employee strives for career growth while fulfilling personal and professional objectives. Several factors such as working arrangement, constant feedback, compensation, and recognition scheme for employees will determine the employee experience in the long run.

Related- employee retention strategies for 2022.

Related- beginner’s carer planning guide: a definitive path to success.

Engagement- how involved and appreciated an employee feels in the workplace impacts the overall experience. His relationships with other colleagues or managers, his enthusiasm for work, and his job satisfaction derived have an enormous bearing on employee morale. This conclusively results in a good employee experience.

Exit- people are leaving even high-paying jobs, due to a lack of career advancement opportunities. For better retention and reduced turnover, the employee experience you provide shall be outstanding to bring out the best in the people. If you choose to look sideways, you may end up with a maximized risk of people leaving your company.

So, employee experience encompasses all that the employee feels, sees, and goes through at work. Also, companies who strive to focus more on human experiences over processes, are known to have 21% more profitability and 17% more productivity. It is high time HR managers act on implementing meaningful employee experience strategies.

Why Do You Need to Focus On EX?

Human capital being your most valuable asset, are heterogeneous and capable of evolving every day. Their expectations and requirements need to be put first to have a powerful work culture. Even more, a positive employee experience will give you an added advantage of enhanced customer experience, lower turnover, lower hiring costs, improved motivation and performance, a healthy workforce and the list goes on.

Still, Confused? Here Are Some Easy Ideas to Improve Employee Experience Within Your Workplace

1. Build a healthy communication stream Your employees are your topmost priority. What you give to them, you’ll receive in return. Meaning- create open lines of communication for your workforce so that there are no gaps for failure and ignorance. Your communication with your people will matter more than with the investors, customers, media, or other target audiences. The way you interact with your workforce determines their output of work, so offer them a good conversation platform.

2. Be an active listener The key to improving relationships with your employees is to not just listen but also comprehend them. Your employees will thank you for your constant motivation and empowerment. You don’t always have to habituate into being a rebuker, instead, listen to the needs of your employees- be it mental or physical issues. Don’t ever let your employees feel alienated when they are undergoing family and work stress.

Pro tip- You can conceptualize a meaningful employee wellness program, to achieve a smooth working environment, that also adds to a positive employee experience.

3. Bespoke training The HR's work doesn’t end with Onboarding and easing a candidate into his routine work. Employees are vulnerable and require constant guidance and training when introduced to new technology or modern machinery. To build a versatile workforce, provide them with specialized toolkits, resources and necessary training modules such as stimulations, e-learning, coaching, lectures, etc. Look closely into the needs of the workers and help them engage more effectively.

4. Growth incentives Offer employees growth opportunities to improve their experience with your company. For example- You can create a career pathway for them. You can effectuate employee engagement and ensure a bright future for your employees by:

Supporting your employees’ constant ups killing

Career consultation

Performance bonuses

Responsive feedback on performance

Offer paid leaves

A pool of high-skilled workforce

Offer travel reimbursements

Encourage employee wellness

Conduct off-site team-building activities, and so on…

5. Appreciate the good work Employee experience is about the interactions your employees have at work. Great leaders are those who support and make employees feel recognized for their hard work. One way you can boost employee experience is by encouraging employees at achieving milestones whether big or small.

Finally, skilled HR professionals are aware of the fact that creating a positive employee experience is more than just offering your employees their paychecks. To achieve this, keep in mind 3 factors to achieve a rewarding workplace: Inclusivity, diversity, and flexibility.

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