HOW TO DESIGN THE EMPLOYEE EXPE RIENCE

It's no secret that work takes up a big chunk of your life.

In fact, the average American spends 90,000 hours at work over their lifetime.

And, because such a large percentage of an employee's life is spent working, companies
must create an environment that others want to work at each day. By designing and
enhancing an employee experience, you can expect to see greater levels of engagement,
satisfaction, retention and company commitment.

Leading by Example
Research by employee experience expert Jacob Morgan found that employees care the
most about these three work environments:

1. Cultural
2. Technological
3. Physical

Morgan also found that there are a handful of companies who have focused on culture,
technology and physical spaces to yield real business results. For example:

 Airbnb, an online marketplace for home rentals, focuses on employee experience by

allowing their employees to design and build their own conference rooms.

 Adobe, a computer software company, has made it their mission to increase diversity
and inclusion, provide their employees with feedback programs and top-notch
technology and is constantly experimenting with different workspace plans.

 LinkedIn, a business and employment-oriented online platform, is known for hosting

HR hackathons to help gather new ideas and different ways to engage employees.

Out of nearly 250 organizations Morgan analyzed, only 6 percent have been as ‘experiential’
with their innovation with culture, technology and physical workspaces as Airbnb, Adobe and
LinkedIn.
And, according to Morgan, this small percentage of organizations are reaping these big
rewards:

Four times higher average profits

 Two times higher average revenues

 40 percent lower turnover
 24 percent smaller headcount

Sound appealing? Even organizations with smaller budgets can achieve these results so
long as they have a plan for designing their employee experience.

Designing Your Own Employee Experience

The first step innovative companies take to improve their employee experience is
reevaluating how they look at change through design thinking.

Design thinking, a solution-based approach to resolving problems, can be useful to solve

complex employee experience issues that can sometimes plague organizations.

The stages in design thinking related to employee experience are:

 Empathize: Employers must be able to empathize with their employees in order to

gain a greater understanding of their ideal work environment. By doing so,
organizations are more likely to be able to develop a well-rounded plan of action.
 Define: Organizations must define and develop their ideal employee experience. You
can do so by mapping out the necessary steps to get there and be sure to use
employees’ insights to drive those steps.
 Ideate: Organizations must start coming up with concrete ideas and identify work
environment solutions.
 Prototype: Create a scalable solution and run it past your employees, who will either
accept, reject or provide feedback for re-examination.
 Test: Make sure the solution not only works but is accepted among your employees.
There may still be some rough edges to smooth out, but this final stage should be
viewed as an iterative process.

Ultimately, using design thinking to improve the employee experience will provide
organizations with an in-depth understanding of their employees’ needs, wants and desires
and allow an organization to make changes based on employee insights.

Involve Your Employees

For many organizations who feel overwhelmed by the idea of improving their employee
experience, hiring a dedicated employee experience manager is an option. Common titles
range from the likes of global chief employee experience officer and head of employee
experience.

The role of an employee experience manager is most closely related to a human resources
management position. By including a similar role within your organization, you’ll have a
dedicated professional whose sole purpose is to create and maintain a positive and
rewarding work environment.

The individual in this role will:

 Listen to employees’ feedback and propose scalable suggestions and solutions for
improvement to senior leadership
 Ensure employees feel valued and invested in their work
  Create and implement employee programs and benefits such as financial wellness
programs or ergonomic updates in the office

With a dedicated employee experience manager role, your organization will be able to
recruit and retain talented employees who feel happy, valued and invested in their day-to-
day work.

Just Take Action

Regardless of if you have a big or small budget, or if you handle employee experience with
your existing team or bring someone else on board, a new perspective can yield favorable
business results for your organization.

All it takes is simply thinking outside the box, and taking action.

By Megan Wells