What is today’s new employee experience?

Employee experience is a worker's perceptions about their journey through all the touchpoints at a particular company. It starts with the job application and continues through leaving the company and beyond. The company's physical workspace, culture and technology are all critical components of the employee experience.

Workers are re-evaluating their relationship with work. 

There were unprecedented numbers of people working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. This massive change gave people who had not previously had the opportunity to work remotely the chance to try a new way of working.

Only your people can decide whether their new employee experience is a good one

There are still many questions as to the value of having a physical workplace.

Some questions employers should look at when they have a remote workforce might include:

• What do people miss – if they miss anything – the people or the building?
• Is the value of a physical workplace in the people connections it supports including career and social?
• How would/wouldn’t people and business performance improve with a full/part/optional return to the office?
• What is the employee wellbeing cost/opportunity of full/no/hybrid return to a workplace? And is it the same for everyone? For example, country, life stage, job function and career objectives?

Traditionally, many people have met lifelong friends and partners at work. They may have socialized, played sports and gone to social events with people they met through work.

It will be interesting to see how this new employee experience turns out in the future. Will Gen Z and those following literally live in a virtual world? If so, it will be fascinating to see the outcomes of this social experiment on physical, mental and financial wellbeing.

In our research, we found only about one in three (34%) said their HR systems are effective. Technology should offer opportunities to employees to keep them engaged. People need to feel their work is being noticed.

The experience for many working from home is that they could be working for any organization in the world. There is nothing in their employee experience that screams out “you belong.” No branding on the kitchen wall, or signage on the front lawn. There’s no way of describing what it’s like to work for the company. One day rolls into the next. This needs to change if loyalty is to be raised.

Focus on employee-centricity

Employee experience needs to address the needs of the individual. The COVID-19 pandemic proved that many office jobs can be done remotely and flexibly. For those in customer-facing or logistics positions, this might be flexible shifts to work around families or delayed start times to allow for an easier and, in some cases, a cheaper commute.

Workers in office roles, weeks split into at-home and shared workspace days. These don’t have to be old-school offices, but places where face-to-face collaboration can happen. These might be quarterly team meetings or colleague bubbles, where colleagues can foster a sense of belonging.

This is important as some employees can feel their career development is stalled if they are not always seen by senior leaders.

One sure thing from our research is that firms need to ensure staff can thrive, not just survive at work. The feedback suggests this is most often the case across the U.S. and Western Europe.