The rise of employee experience in the workplace today

Employee experience can be best described as everything an employee learns, does, sees, and feels throughout the course of their employment in a particular workplace. As we described in a previous insight, employee experience refers to the experiences an employee has while working for your company—from the moment they apply for a job to the moment they leave—are all part of their overall employee experience. This includes what they see, hear or even feel.

According to Jacob Morgan, author of The Employee Experience Advantage, in a world where money is no longer the primary motivating factor for employees, focusing on the employee experience is the most promising competitive advantage that organizations can create.

While many companies invest heavily in their customer experience, few of them invest in employee experience, either due to failure to know the benefits, or blatant ignorance. Changing times are surely making organizational leaders realize that employees are a key resource in determining business success and also invest in the employee experience strategy.

The perception/ experience that employees have about their jobs is rapidly becoming a critical issue in the business arena, owing to the systemic changes in the societal, economic, as well as legal changes that characterize modern life. In fact, according to Deloitte research, only 9% of business executives

Numerous factors, such as social media, shifting demographics, and more unstable economic conditions, have contributed to the transition from traditional employee engagement to a more comprehensive approach to the employee experience.

• Employees now expect personalized employee experiences; they expect to be treated as an individual, with their personal needs being addressed on a personal level. 
• The rise of the millennial generation in the workplace has changed workplace dynamics. Unlike previous generations, the millennial generation demands that their interests be addressee, today, here and now, and are seemingly more aggressive and aware of their experience in the workplace. Companies, thus, have to get a better understanding of a generation that feels, thinks, and behaves differently than the generations before it because the millennial generation wants more opportunities to have their say.
• Digitization, disruption, and other economics have greatly introduced uncertainties in the workplace, requiring more workplace productivity, which can best be achieved by a highly engaged workplace.
• With formal employment becoming less and less attractive to the world’s highly empowered workforce, employee experience is quickly gaining traction as a major determinant of where employees apply for work, and a competitive edge that helps employers stand out. 
• Workplaces have become more transparent as a result of the social media boom and the potential for negative reviews to go viral in order to safeguard company and brand reputation.
• The legal system has gained more influence in the business setup, requiring organizational leaders to comply with some aspects of employee experience such as gender inclusion, making it possible for employees to declare their gender and not be discriminated against, no matter how unconventional the declaration.

In today’s open, digital world, where the influence of the Millennial generation is expanding, employees expect a productive, engaging, and enjoyable work experience. Instead of focusing solely on employee engagement and workplace culture, organizations are beginning to develop an integrated focus on the entire employee experience, bringing together all workplace, HR, and management practices that affect people at work.

Analysts argue that in the modern workplace, employee engagement and performance are directly correlated with employee experience. As a result, in order to put a business on the path to success, it is necessary to understand and prioritize the employee experience. According to research, companies that get employee experience right can double customer satisfaction, innovate more, and produce 25% more profits than those that don’t.
There are four key benefits that employee experience brings to workplaces, including;

1. Talent attraction
   With employees becoming increasingly awakened about their rights and alternatives, workplaces hardly stand any chance in attracting quality talent if their employee experience is poor. With the rise in internet and related social media outlets, information about a brand’s employee experience has the ability to fly higher than a company can control, meaning that companies have to be vigilant and deploy a very international employee experience if it ever intends to attract quality talent.
2. Employee engagement
   High levels of employee engagement foster customer loyalty, encourage talent retention, and enhance organizational performance and stakeholder value. According to studies, people who say they had a good experience working for a company are eight times more likely to want to stay there and are sixteen times more engaged than those who say the opposite. Employers need to engage employees more if they want them to enjoy their work and perform better than expected.
3. Employee retention
   According to research, 10% or more of employees quit their jobs within six months of beginning a new position, partly owing to a poor experience attributed to lack of, or poor onboarding process. This means that their experience begins to break down right from the first day, when no one cares to even show them around and help them settle in.  An employee’s desire to stay, productivity, and perception of the company culture can all be significantly impacted by an efficient onboarding process or other introduction to an organization.
4. Bottomline improvement
   According to experts, happier employees lead to higher revenue. Companies that scored the highest on employee experience benchmarks had four times the average profits, two times the average revenues, and 40% less turnover than those that didn’t, according to a study by SHRM of more than 250 international organizations. This shows that making an investment in employee experience is worthwhile.

Also read: Employee experience; how it improves employee performance in the workplace

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