Employee engagement surveys have become an HR staple. Yet, despite their prevalence, a recent study by TLNT and HRmarketer revealed that "45% of respondents feel that the survey being used by their organization had little or no value for managers or employees."
Employee engagement drops when employee engagement surveys are conducted and no follow-up action is taken. And it looks like this may be happening quite often.
With the right employee experience strategy, you can boost your ability to attract, engage and develop high-performing employees.
Moreover, during the Customer Experience Professionals Association Event, it became apparent that many companies are beginning to look at how the Customer Experience (Cx) and Employee Experience (Ex) are related.
What Is the Employee Experience?
The employee experience is the journey an employee takes with your organization. It includes every interaction that happens along the employee life cycle, plus the incidents that involve an employee's role, workspace, manager, and wellbeing.
How Voice of the Employee Can Improve Employee Experience?
Voice of the employee plays an important role when organizations give employees a platform to voice their opinions and give feedback throughout their tenure at the organization.
Creating a Human-centric Experience
Though many leaders delve into VoE programs with financial ROI in mind, ultimately, VoE is about improving employee wellbeing, which translates into a positive financial return. It also translates into a more engaged and productive workforce.
A recent report from Limeade, an employee experience research company, indicated that only 31% of employees feel their employer cares about them as individuals, and one out of three employees have quit a job as a result.
Ensure leaders set the right tone
Usually, senior leaders interact with their workforce less often than managers, so their impact on employee voice is indirect. When leaders make decisions, highly centralized decision-making and the lack of face-to-face interaction with employees may lead to employee opinions not being valued or considered.
Therefore, senior leaders must ensure that employee voice mechanisms are built into the decision-making process. Having an employee representative could help spread the right opinions. This is something organizations could consider including in their company culture.
- Better Branding That Attracts Better Talent
With the employee's voice, the risk to address employee issues reduces. In addition, opinions about products, services, and companies can be shared on social media, online forums, and review sites.
Here, social media listening can help you build your online reputation and take action accordingly. This helps in employee retention and makes competent candidates compete for you more seriously.
Get Valid Data: Feedback, Surveys, Interviews and Discussion
One of the biggest challenges leaders face when implementing a VoE program is getting honest employee feedback. They may be hesitant due to fear of retribution, ridicule, or hostility. Instead, leaders need to create a culture of trust, inclusion, openness, and transparency within the business that is free of judgment, defensiveness, and repercussions.
Along with implementing an open-door policy and an open line of communication, employees need a way to provide ongoing feedback. This may include surveys, feedback reports, one-on-one conversations, and participation in open meetings where leadership, department leads, and workers get to talk about their experiences and pain points openly.
Other methods of obtaining feedback include:
- post-onboarding surveys
- an easily-accessible feedback box
- exit surveys or interviews
- use of a third-party anonymous feedback mechanism
- employee engagement software
- Enhance Opportunities For Collective Learning
One of the major benefits of the voice of the employee is that it allows teams to encounter the benefits of collective learning via inter-team training and collaborations.
Organizations need to inculcate HR strategies and policies, keeping employee engagement, training, learning and growth opportunities, and work satisfaction in mind. After all, an organization that apprehends the importance of the voice of the employee leads to better-honed employees.
Conclusion:
A VoE program can be an effective method to learn about the bottlenecks in business practices, the pain points employees deal with regularly, and potential problems occurring.
But, more importantly, a successful VoE program can help develop a employee experience strategy for workers, increasing their satisfaction, engagement, and feelings of belonging to an organization whose goals and ideals they can believe in.
Read more at: How is VoE Changing the Employee Experience Strategy?
The pandemic has completely changed employee expectations and it’s important for employers to take note of this shift.
Why?Because, according to the Thrive XM Index 2020 report, companies that prioritised employee experience not only performed better once COVID hit, but grew.
This supports the idea that a better employee experience yields better results overall.A Towers Watson study was also able to find a link between employee experience (EX) and financial performance.This points towards the fundamental belief that a good employee experience is at the heart of financial success.
But, how can companies enhance employee experience in this new normal?The Fundamentals of Employee ExperienceConnection and contribution are the fundamentals of employee experience.
Employees need to be able to connect with their colleagues and organisational purpose as well as feel they are contributing to the business and are being rewarded accordingly.Here are ways that you can enhance employee experience in your organisation:Read more
