5 Things HR Can Do to Improve Employee Experience

Experience is about a series of moments that go on to form negative, positive, or neutral memories. Each of these moments tends to leave a lasting impression on our minds, and they decide if our overall experience has been a good or a bad one. However, we do not seem to view life as a series of checks and balances. For instance, one bad experience can wipe out months of positive experiences, and likewise, one bad experience in any shop make stop you from revisiting it.

Employee experience indicates interactions on a daily basis which define the working life of an individual. This experience can be either positive, or negative, or neutral. It includes everything that an employee goes through right from the first level of interaction with an organization to their daily work life and to the day when they finally quit the company.

86% of recruiters are of the opinion that presently we are thriving in an employee-driven resource market. Hence, employee experience certainly decides whether you can lure as well as retain the ace performers that your business needs in order to thrive successfully.

That is the sole reason why HR is nowadays mainly focussing towards managing and improving the employee experience so that it leads to employee satisfaction in the long run. This article discusses some of the steps that you can take to improve employee experience in your organisation.

Treat your employees like your customers

Marketing strategies always depend on customer experience to use as a metric. It defines the expectations of customers and helps them to introduce marketing strategies which will help to lure and retain customers. Likewise, HR needs to apply similar strategies in order to gauge the experience of employees. They need to look out for negative or positive patterns and thereby make improvements in whichever area they can. Unhappy employees tend to be non-productive. Hence, a customer-centric approach in your HR strategy will help you to manage your employees’ expectations within the organisation in order to ensure employee satisfaction.

Focus on the bigger picture

Employees always tend to expect organisations to offer them a seamless experience right from the stage of hiring to retiring. So once an employee becomes an integral part of your organisation or team, you cannot allow the intensive efforts that go into interviews, onboarding, orientation, training etc. to be fizzled out. In fact, it becomes even more important to extend your support to employees after they establish themselves as an essential asset to your organisation or team.

Organisations need to continuously invest in the future generation of employees to ensure that they tend to the personal development of employees as it is a bare minimum requirement that is expected out of them as an employer. You must remember that your employees are your biggest brand asset. Hence, you must ensure that they are engaged, happy, and satisfied at every stage of the employee lifecycle. That would be the key to your future success.

Continually develop your employee brand

If you can attract talented individuals even before they are thinking of applying to your organisation, it clearly indicates the strength of your corporate brand in the market. An organisation’s first impression matters the same way as it does for individuals. Hence you must develop your online brand, as it is a must in today’s digital world.

Around 69% of respondents in a survey revealed that they would not wish to take up a job with an organisation which has a poor reputation, even if they are jobless. Hence, the reputation an organisation holds is indeed essential. You must learn to project yourself as an organisation in the right perspective and focus on how you interact with people before they become part of your organisation. Employee experience does not commence with the signing of an employee’s contract. Hence, employee experience needs to an integral part of how you engage and interact with prospective employees.

Focus on the Employee Experience

It is a fact that organisations which do not offer a pleasurable and simple experience to its employees are bound to struggle to retain and engage top talent. It all boils down to how you create a culture and an experience which motivates employees to be a part of your organisation. When you offer your employees with an amazing employee experience, it gives you a competitive edge in terms of your ability to attract and retain top performers. When there is an engaged workforce, there is bound to be increased productivity, and you end up gaining human capital. This will help you establish yourself in the market as a great place to work.

Build a workplace for the future

One of the challenges that organisations face is to adapt to volatile technologies and to build an environment which will attract the present day generation. In order to create an experiential workplace, you need to develop a continuous loop of communication and focus on the individual needs and goals of your employees. It is here that self-service HR software comes to your rescue by providing employees with the medium to give increased feedback. It also facilitates them to chart out their personal development along with inputs from their respective managers. It empowers employees to develop better relationships with their colleagues and also helps them to feel more invested in an organization.

An experiential workplace is all about focusing on each individual and how it manages interaction between the organisation and the people in and around them. Experiences shape how you view individuals and if you wish to spend time with them. Same is the case with employee experience.

Hence HR needs to develop an environment which offers a positive employee experience, provide apt strategies to its existing and future employees, and build a culture that supports this.