30 Sep What Consumer Apps Can Teach Us About Creating a Great Employee Experience
Remember how easy it was to order that ostrich pillow from Amazon (you know, to re-energize with five-minute power naps between Zoom meetings)? No? Me either.
But I bet you are familiar with how simple Amazon has made it to purchase virtually anything you could think of to solve for real, everyday needs — whether that be for your survival, personal development, or comfort.
It all comes down to the user experience: Just about anything you might be looking for is accessible in one place. And once you’ve found what you need, getting it delivered is a matter of one click.
Imagine if it were that easy for employees to find solutions to their individual needs at work.
Why an Employee Experience App?
The way your employees feel has become more important in terms of the success of an organization. This can include how employees interact with each other but also how they interact with their employers.
Companies that prioritize experience tend to have more engaged, productive, and satisfied employees, which can lead to higher retention rates, better customer service, and increased profitability.
An employee experience app can be a great employee benefit that not only improves their satisfaction but helps with employee retention as well.
Improved Communication
Employees consider communication one of the biggest factors that create a positive work environment. It makes their job easier but also helps them feel like they’re being heard.
Increased Involvement
An employee experience app can provide employees with a sense of connection and engagement with their colleagues and the company. This can help employee retention by allowing them to feel like they’re not just a number.
Enhanced Learning and Development
An employee experience app can provide employees with access to training modules and other learning resources, which can help to improve their skills and knowledge. This can lead to better performance on the job, as well as increased job satisfaction and retention rates.
Here are some of the things that might be getting in the way of you providing your employees with the best experience app.
Overwhelming Options
Although your organization may have centralized locations for some employee resources, companies today are facing pressures to overload their tech stacks with an assortment of new point solutions to address a host of maturing priorities.
When you’re creating a great employee experience, you’re doing a lot of things all at once. You might be trying to improve wellness, collaboration, learning, rewards, planning, technology, or more.
Having a modern employee experience strategy helps develop a network of systems that have high utilization rates.
Unfortunately, this isn’t always the case with most apps. There are simply too many hoops people have to jump through to get what they need.
Lack of Personalization
The technology we use in our everyday lives has become very good at tailoring experiences to our personal interests. For example, earlier today Spotify accurately guessed that I would enjoy hearing Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody†while making my usual breakfast — turns out oatmeal and guitar solos do pair nicely.
The point is, we’ve become accustomed to technology doing a lot of the work required to use it for us. But work systems have largely lagged behind, creating a stark contrast between the tools employees use for healthcare, communication, or skill development, for example, and those used for everything people do outside of work.
It doesn’t have to be this way. And to create an employee experience that actually improves important metrics like retention and performance, business leaders must raise the bar for how new applications are used.
How to Create a Great Employee Experience the Right Way
Getting employee experience right isn’t about checking off a new set of boxes with shiny technology. That approach will only net a messy, confusing gauntlet of screens, brands, apps, and logins that end up driving your people away.
Instead, it’s about designing a portfolio of enterprise applications tailored to the specific needs of your workforce. You’ll know when you’re on the right track. It will start to feel like using Amazon: quick, easy access to resources that solve each individual need.
In our latest e-book, we share more details on how to use technology to meaningfully support every aspect of the employee experience. We believe it’s essential to the longevity of your company that you prioritize employee experience right away.