As companies invest in Digital Workplaces and Intranets, Employee experience (EX) is a term that is quickly creeping into the digital sphere. Intranets are no new phenomenon (having been around for over 20 years), but in more recent years they have been instrumental in enabling new ways of working and increasing employee engagement and support. Niamh Harman and Federico Burch recently spoke about the importance of developing applications that value EX at the MUXL festival of UX and design. They emphasised the growing importance of EX since the start of remote working, but made the point that digital workplaces can only go as far as your underlying working culture.
Employee experience is a fairly broad description of a worker’s perception of the digital and non-digital touch points within an organisation, made up of the physical workplace, culture and technologies. Often abbreviated to EX, the proliferation of the term used in a digital sense, especially in the design of modern workplaces and intranets, means many digital consulting agencies are neglecting the human and physical elements of the concept. At ClerksWell, we are committed to ensuring our clients culture match their modern digital strategies to ensure their employees can maximise efficiency, but also feel supported.
Niamh Harman and Federico Burch, lead UX designers at Salesforce, spoke this week about salesforce’ focus on designing for impact and putting the employee’s wellbeing at the centre of their strategy. Salesforce is known for its CRM systems which have transformed how organisations manage their sales pipeline and client management. Over the last year, they have started to enter a new space which uses Modern Workplace applications to ensure employees feel valued and supported in their work environments. But this strategy goes far beyond the applications; this strategy takes a proactive role in transforming employee experience in the workplace to unlock their full potential.
Whilst technical applications, Intranets, and Modern Workplaces are useful, the best programmes will not have an impact in an organisation if the culture that underpins everything remains toxic. For example, if you set up an application which allows your employees to access free fitness videos and mindfulness sessions, then you must also ensure the core business processes echo the value of health & wellbeing, otherwise those technical applications will fall short. When employees feel their mental health is undervalued, they would more likely sacrifice productivity to regain a healthier work life balance. This makes employee experience not only a ‘nice to have’, but instead a ‘must have’ for business success.
Good EX can take many forms and can be strengthened with Modern Workplace applications that enhance collaboration and provide necessary support channels. Niamh Harman lists the following strategies which are applicable to both small and large companies.
These include:
These measures complement digital workplace strategies and value the entire employee experience. As digitalisation transforms the workplace, organisations must remember to modernise their culture too. EX is not just about document management and productivity, it’s about creating a harmonious workplace that values human-centric design.
Here at ClerksWell we value our own employees as well as the employees of our clients. Check out our own Microsoft modern workplace success stories on our website and send us an email on hello@clerkswell.com for all enquiries.
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