Written by Ben Whitter, World Employee Experience Institute (WEEI).

Employee experience is the #1 human capital trend in 2017. No question. Employee experience is taking hold within the economy. With more companies than you can count opting to fully embrace this new future, not just for HR, but for the whole business, the time for this renewed and energizing focus on the quality of our experiences in work has come. And guess what? It’s not just the technology firms leading this workplace revolution.

But what exactly is employee experience?

Employee experience is the intentional design and engineering of a high value, integrated and end-to-end employee journey within work. From pre-hire to retire, using experience as a lens, we can maximise all the interactions an individual has with an employer over the long-term to create a deep sense of belonging and co-create high performance and stronger business outcomes.

This is not for everyone; it takes a real commitment to provide a superior workplace experience. This is evident in the investment in technology, tools, and physical infrastructure as well as the progressive design of key HR and management practices. All of this is aligned and co-ordinated to have maximum impact in translating the vision and values of the business into a day-to-day reality to drive great business outcomes.

Just ask GE, Lazada, Aurecon, Harrods, GSK, Riot Games, Nike, Maxis, Atlassian, Commonwealth Bank, DBS, and of course, the technology icons are all in there too with LinkedIn, Cisco, Facebook and Airbnb charting an experiential path.

The Chinese ‘Big 4’ are also locking experience into operations with Baidu, Tencent, Alibaba, and Huawei proving to be top pick for talented graduates who want to create history through a compelling mission and purpose.

Does your organisation have an all-consuming mission? It should, and employee experience is there to bring that to life.

Why should HR be concerned about employee experience?

It was my pleasure to keynote and introduce employee experience to hundreds of colleagues at the HR Summit Asia 2017 in May. What became clear as I digested the talks, meetings, and my own sessions at the conference is that the experience of work is the only conversation that matters. This was more than evident in the key talks across all conference streams- experience is at the forefront of the discussion within business and HR. Yet, it still feels like some organisations and markets are just warming up. We need to change that picture and get ahead. I’m here to help you do just that.

So how does an employee experience approach reshape the structure of a business? Well, one model we are seeing being rolled out now within global businesses is that of a Chief Employee Experience Officer who has oversight, authority and accountability over the entire holistic employee experience.

This mandate includes all or some of the main employee-facing function such as HR, recruitment, L&D, marketing, IT, estates, catering and internal comms. With a strong business leader at the top of that, experience is being positioned as a strategic imperative. Other organisations are leading coalitions made of internal services that have collectively fostered a team around the employee experience and have a key sponsor in place from the top team. The proof around which approach is best will be in the outcomes.

“The end-to-end journey of the employee experience is critical, from the way people are hired and then on-boarded to how they learn and develop with the organisation, and how their overall contribution is measured and rewarded.”

What I have also observed on my travels is that HR is in serious danger of missing a huge opportunity as the employee experience mandate is being given to a range of internal functions to lead. At one organisation I met, the key lead was IT given the high impact of tech and digital on our workplaces. In another, it was internal communications given the communication, branding, and marketing opportunities for great workplaces, and another example I observed saw estates in the driving seat given the clear links between the quality of our physical infrastructures and employee engagement levels. So, every part of the corporate world is positioning around employee experience, and for good reason. That’s because the end-to-end journey of the employee experience is critical, from the way people are hired and then on-boarded to how they learn and develop with the organisation, and how their overall contribution is measured and rewarded. In the past, much of this has been fragmented or focused on short-term, unaligned, and not very strategic engagement activities. Not anymore.

Employee experience is about the whole 3D Employee Experience™- being able to define, design and deliver workplaces where people belong, find meaning, and create astonishing human achievements. This is what we are focused on at the World Employee Experience Institute (WEEI).

So how do you get started on the employee experience journey. Here are 10 points of focus:

1. First things first. Progressive companies are understanding that the ‘people’ thing matters more in this economy as a significant competitive advantage. Take it seriously. Position it as a priority. “People are our asset”- Mean it. Breathe it. Lead it.

2. To restructure or not restructure? That is the question. The business needs to be accountable for the employee experience in some way whether through the board or other mechanisms. Jeff Bezos of Amazon famously has one empty chair at his management team meetings. I would recommend two. You know who the other chair represents. Keep the customer and employee experience together they are best friends and will thank you for it.

3. Quite frankly, it is time to sharpen the responsibilities and remits around employee experience. Bring the full employee experience into the play by consciously shaping and guiding its development across functions and roles. If you can, ensure this is led from or at least sponsored by the entire top team (Idealistic) or by one named accountable senior executive (more realistic for a lot of organisations).

4. At the outset, focus on the ‘experience’ points that matter most to staff and prioritize them. Employee experience is a long-term, strategic approach. Most organisations don’t have the resources or mandate to go 100% employee experience immediately (if you do, great, enjoy!) so work with staff to figure what needs to be developed early within the experience at your organisation and narrow the focus on some data-informed pain points that you can get to work on straight away.

“Every employee journey begins with the first step…get started and get ready for the long-haul. “

In that sense, I would say that you don’t immediately need to worry about what you can’t change, control or influence. Make sure your immediate attention and energy is directed towards the things that you CAN control or influence. Every employee journey begins with the first step…get started and get ready for the long-haul.

5. Within early employee experience approaches, we do need to find the believers- the ones who really get the point about people making the difference and creating the real value within a business. Work with them. Bring them into the movement alongside employees to co-create something special, together. The days of developing ‘engagement’ activities within one function of corporate HQ’s are gone. As Cisco did, you may want to beak some stuff along the way like they did with the HR function, and why not. Break it, then build something better. Real transformation starts from within. If your HR function is uninspiring, do something about that issue early. Where you see processes, we see experiences! Make them count.

6. What is happening in practice right now is driven by in-context research and solid people analytics. Practitioners must understand the context and build something within it. Everything must enhance or strengthen internal capacity and capability. We don’t need to be dependent on outside providers unless real value is being added. How do you know if it is? Check your results and the feedback from staff and data also talks wisely. It could be engagement or brand outcomes, or if you are really moving ahead, go straight to the business performance data and work backwards!

Data is key. How engaged is your workplace? How are the HR metrics doing? Where are you up to with strategy and performance outcomes? Develop capabilities to ensure that you can harness all the data in a compelling way. Utilize it to build either a better experience for your staff, or a superior experience within your sector. This depends on the appetite and leadership of your business.

7. Within employee experience we have a new approach to benefits, rewards, and perks so introduce free food, free parking and every other perk you can think of. Actually, don’t do that. Get yourself into a place where you can step back and think about the overall design of the experience.

The employee experience must be authentic and in harmony; in that respect, everything needs to relate to your overall strategy, approach and brand. Don’t just introduce free food “because Google do it”.

8. A big part of experience is the actual design of the workplace. There is heavy investment in infrastructure projects right now especially within large organisations that have or are experiencing high disruption within their industries; consider the physical and technology workplace infrastructure and how it can better serve the needs (and wants) of your employees to get their jobs done well and enjoy doing so. I met with over 10 major banks and consulting firms recently who attended my events or met me for private chats, and the scale of their investment in the employee experience is eyewatering. Simply incredible. They are getting ready for the future right now to attract the best talent and the best clients. Hint: this is not just about funky furniture, pool tables, and slides. Employee experience is all about creating a deeper connection between your staff, your customers, and your business. The design of the workplace is a helpful facilitator of that connection and should, when done well, easily and naturally ooze what is important to your organisation.

9. Employee experience unlocks serious wins for talent attraction, retention, and engagement. Employers can’t leave this to chance and need to channel a lot of energy into communicating the employee experience, inside and out. This will bring talented people and talented people leaders to you in droves. It will also be the biggest way of differentiating between you and other organisations.

10. Crucially, leadership remains a critical factor within the organisation; find the best and develop great leaders who do not see the employee experience as a secondary matter. The great leaders integrate employee experience into their business practice; poor leaders do not and that should also be addressed as part of the employee experience approach. Think about this. How would you rate the experience of working with your organisation on a scale of 1—10?

If you are rating below an 8 or a 9 then I would encourage you to get started on the points above right now this second because if your competitors are not already investing in and positioning their employee experience to compete with yours, they will be doing very soon, and that is very smart business indeed!

 

Ben Whitter is described as the World’s “Mr Employee Experience”™ and the ‘1# figure in employee experience around the World right now’. Ben is the Founder of the World Employee Experience Institute (WEEI), a leading employee experience consulting, training, and research organisation operating globally, and home to the World Employee Experience Community.

Gea Peper founder of the HappinessBureau interviewed Ben during his masterclass in Brussels.