How Would Your Employees Describe Their Experience with You?

You have no doubt heard of “employee engagement,” but what about “employee experience”?

Engagement is usually measured through annual reviews or (maybe) occasional surveys, but that is a “snapshot” view and is often disengaged from what employees are actually experiencing in their day-to-day time with you – and perhaps also disengaged from organizational performance. A newer – and more effective – measure is that of gathering employee experience data, and it requires a whole new approach, one in which managers/supervisors solicit and learn to accept feedback [without feeling threatened]; and employees learn how to give meaningful feedback [without feeling threatened or at risk]. This is an ongoing process (as is company performance), as opposed to a “point-in-time” evaluation, and it requires training in new skills for the management/supervisory team so they can collect, interpret and act on data obtained in the ongoing process. It also requires effective advance notification to the employees so they are not “blindsided” by a new system, stifling possible feedback.

Ultimately, the objective is to develop a correlation between business performance and employee experience data, both of which are ongoing phenomena, as noted (and should be treated as such), as opposed to the aforementioned “snapshots.” This enables establishing a correlation that gives a more accurate picture of how the organization is actually functioning, and the treatment of employees as individuals, as opposed to a single composite entity. It will likely necessitate the development of a new reporting structure designed to obtain the ongoing feedback needed for success.