In this blog, we discuss the employee experience framework and how you can create it step-by-step for your organization. We will also cover ways to measure the ROI of your employee experience framework and discuss common challenges and their solutions. Read to learn how to design, implement, and measure an EX framework to boost engagement, reduce turnover, and unlock business success.
Businesses worldwide are talking about revving up employee experiences (EX) in recent years, and we chime it’s for good measure. In fact, employee experience experts at MIT found that companies in the top quartile of EX were twice as innovative as those in the bottom quartile. They also found that companies focusing on EX saw a 25% increase in profitability. Conversely, companies ignoring this suffered from poor engagement, higher attrition, and reduced productivity. These consequences were literally due to working against the definition of employee experience.
Bottom line: Implementing a solid employee experience strategy is an excellent strategy you can pursue to overcome these undesirable outcomes and unlock business success. And we’re here to simplify it for you!
What is an employee experience framework?
An employee experience framework is a structured approach to designing, managing, improving, and sustaining positive employee experiences throughout their lifecycle. It includes the different touchpoints and employee interactions, from recruitment and onboarding to ongoing development, engagement, and departure.
When you implement the framework, you essentially cover varied aspects like employee journey mapping, employee satisfaction and engagement, establishing employee experience principles and values, developing strategies and initiatives to address employee experience drivers. It also covers implementing feedback mechanisms, effective communication and integration of the employee experience framework and establishing key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure your framework's impact on business outcomes.
Here's what you can expect a typical employee engagement framework to look like:
Does the company size matter in the context of an employee experience framework?
A common belief among most HR practitioners is that employee experience frameworks make sense to implement only for larger organizations. When in fact - organizations of all sizes can benefit from an EX framework. The key is to ensure it is customized to their size and goals. To get this right, you’ll need to start with understanding various processes and, most importantly, company culture. Let’s go into the steps in detail.
5 steps to creating your employee experience framework
Step 1. Assess your current state
Before building your custom employee experience framework, make sure you assess the status quo so that you begin with proper context.
Consider aspects like current business challenges, your company culture and scale of operations and where you’re at regarding existing employee experiences. A good starting point for getting business information is your existing software tools. But don’t stop here, as you must go deeper to gather insights into your employees' needs, preferences, pain points, and expectations for a well-rounded EX framework. Spend time to understand the various demographics, roles, and departments within your organization. Once you do that, also engage in brainstorming sessions with your leadership. Accounting for their vision and views will help you get a well-rounded perspective. Alongside, make sure you also collect opinions and feedback about existing gaps directly from existing employees, vendors, and other stakeholders.
Step 2. Define your goals and values
Next, clearly outline the objectives and goals you aim to achieve by enhancing the employee experience. This is what will guide specific aspects of your EX framework. For this, explore what business goals and values you want to reinforce through an EX framework. For example, improving employee engagement, increasing productivity. Once you do that, start synthesizing the business goals with employee satisfaction. This will help you create a balanced framework. Tools like Miro or MURAL can be super handy to define the framework's objectives clearly.
Step 3. Map the employee journey
With your base set, next you need to visualize your employee journey in detail from recruitment to exit. Your goal should be to map employee interactions, milestones, and performance objectives. Within this, make sure you identify the key drivers of employee experiences.
For example, factors such as leadership, culture, communication, recognition. In this process, look out for the specific employee pain points at the different touchpoints that give rise to challenges like attrition, disengagement, and poor productivity. Spending time on this is necessary if you want to avoid escalations, potential exits, and poor performance. Remember to do this exercise for both frontline and in-office employees to ensure you build a comprehensive framework.
Step 4. Design your framework
Once you identify and align the company's needs and employees' inner motivations, start designing an employee experience framework to crystallize your ideas. Make sure you personalize it to different groups for optimum results.
A good way to get started is to first define the principles and values that will underpin your employee experience framework. In this process, make sure this reflects your organization's culture, mission, and vision while fostering a supportive and inclusive work environment. In addition, focus on developing strategies and initiatives to enhance employee experience across the identified touchpoints.
Step 5. Communication and implementation
Once you’ve designed your framework, you need to communicate it effectively to all organizational stakeholders. This is vital for proper understanding and implementation. If you want to succeed, you’ll also need alignment and buy-in from leadership, managers, and employees at all levels. Sorting this will ensure the overall company experience aligns with your framework.
Make sure you reach out to all individuals and groups using a mix of synchronous and asynchronous communication, such as email newsletters, text messaging, and physical meetings. Employee experience platforms work great as a unified communication source for both in-office and front-line workers. Another good approach to implement your EX policies is by breaking your framework into chunks and creating quick communication campaigns.
Step 6. Continuous improvement
Finally, you need to continuously monitor and evaluate your EX framework to ensure its effectiveness. So, regularly collect and review feedback to assess the situation. Based on that, iterate on your strategies and initiatives to address evolving employee needs and organizational dynamics.
Don’t forget these critical elements of a good employee experience framework
When developing or implementing employee experience frameworks, encountering differing opinions is a common challenge you may face. In such situations, having an ethical and sound leadership voice can help you anchor employee needs with business goals.
Moreover, it’s also common to find communication getting misinterpreted or lost if not implemented correctly. So, make sure it’s targeted, personalized, and delivered seamlessly across channels in real time. Using EX platforms is a simple way to strengthen your employee experience framework and ensure all stakeholders achieve goals.
Finally, always remember that following a restricted, rigid employee experience framework isn’t ideal for all the employee personas in any organization
Hence, it’s best if you create multiple EX frameworks for different employee groups. Because after all when it comes to effective communication, the same message won't work for all employee groups. This will help you to provide an appropriate blueprint to enhance EX in every situation. You can once again use an EX app to create multiple EX frameworks.
Case study: How WISAG implemented an employee experience framework
WISAG’s developed an EX framework to enable its desk and non-desk workers to have similar levels of engagement, productivity, and a sense of belongingness. The German company, which offers building and personnel services, previously found it challenging to engage its non-desk employees, which resulted in the poor implementation of its EX framework. After deploying a dedicated employee communication app, WISAG could reach and engage both desk and non-desk employees, resulting in enhanced experience and user activity.
How to measure the ROI of an employee experience framework
The key to measuring the ROI of an EX framework is to identify different protocols and processes you've put in place for each stage of the employee lifecycle. This depends on your company's unique requirements and cannot be generalized. Some of the KPIs that help with the EX framework and employee experience assessment include:
- Talent acquisition metrics such as time-to-fill positions, cost-per-hire, and applicant satisfaction scores.
- Employee engagement scores, employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS).
- Employee retention rates such as turnover rate and retention rates before and after implementing the employee experience framework.
- Productivity metrics such as output per employee, sales per employee.
- Absenteeism and presenteeism rates before and after implementing the framework.
- Financial metrics such as changes in revenue, profitability, and cost savings due to employee satisfaction, engagement, and productivity.
- Customer satisfaction scores and loyalty metrics, such as customer retention rates and repeat business
What are some common challenges of implementing an employee experience framework?
When you implement an EX framework, there are some common challenges you may face.
Challenge 1. Lack of leadership buy-in when it comes to EX framework implementation
One of the most common is the lack of leadership buy-in. This often leads to underwhelming budget allocations for particular employee needs and concerns. For example, if your staff requires a better cafeteria, your leadership should be in on it, too. You can use insights from your existing tools to identify gaps and create crisp presentations that convey your needs convincingly.
Challenge 2. Gathering feedback about employee experience
Another teething trouble most organizations face is difficulty in gathering employee feedback. You need to acknowledge that desk and non-desk workers operate differently. So gaining clarity regarding their unique challenges may be difficult. To overcome this, you can implement a process to collect employee feedback via mobile-friendly forms that both groups can use easily.
Challenge 3. Aligning the employee experience framework with company culture
In addition, aligning the framework with your company culture can also get difficult. There can be loopholes, such as authoritarian leadership, cliques, etc. However, aligning this is necessary, as the company culture sets the tone of how people behave, feel, and perceive their time at an organization. Take special care to ensure your framework complements your culture’s positive aspects. Last but not least, it is crucial to identify the right KPIs. For that, it’s best if you choose a tool that tracks the most pertinent metrics related to your framework's performance.
Ready to build a robust employee experience framework to give a boost to your organization?
It’s well established that satisfied, motivated employees are a company's most valuable resource. An EX framework provides the blueprint for enhancing employee experience while balancing employee needs with organizational goals and commitments. Leverage it to avoid pitfalls like disengagement, poor productivity, and attrition, and maximize your business impact.