Why Employee Experience is About More Than Happy Employees

It’s hard to read anything related to IT service management (ITSM) these days that doesn’t mention experiences, whether it’s customer experience, employee experience, end-user experience, or service experience. For IT service desks, in particular, the topic of employee (or end-user) experience is prevalent either as a standalone area for improvement or in the mix with other ITSM trends such as artificial intelligence (AI) and enterprise service management. For example, in a recent AI adoption survey, improving employee experience was the third most chosen option for introducing AI capabilities in IT.

But when we talk about employee experience, it’s important to understand what’s involved, especially that employee experience is about more than “happy” employees. This blog explains more about the importance of measuring and improving employee experiences.

Putting (poor) employee experiences into context – employee productivity

The easiest way to start placing employee experiences into context is through experience data that shows poor experiences do more than make employees unhappy. This is well demonstrated in the freely available HappySignals employee experience data it periodically shares in its Global IT Experience Benchmark Report.

Example insights from the latest Benchmark Report include that employees are increasingly unhappy with the suitability of their corporate IT equipment and software:

Source: HappySignals, The 10th Global IT Experience Benchmark (H1/2023)

These three areas are way behind aspects of IT service delivery and support that score well. For example, ticket-based services (incidents and requests) score +80. Even the IT service portal scores +43 despite being the least “loved” IT support channel (with employees perceiving that they lose close to an additional two hours when using the IT service portal versus calling the IT service desk).

These employee experience data points show not only where IT is hindering rather than helping employees but also the impact it has on their work. Because the measurement of an employee’s perceived lost time (caused by IT issues) reflects the effect of poor experiences on employee productivity. Backing up the quantitative data and anecdotal views related to employees being frustrated by their use of workplace technology and services.

However, this employee productivity loss and how it affects business operations, while incredibly important, aren’t the only adverse impacts of poor employee experiences.

Putting (poor) employee experiences into context – employee well-being and retention issues

According to research conducted by Deloitte in June 2023 into employee well-being shows that work is getting harder, with indicative statistics including that 55% of workers feel that work is getting more intense and demanding, and 64% of managers have considered quitting for a job that would better support their well-being. But, the factors causing well-being issues are usually unreported, perhaps because well-being issues can result from multiple factors related to the workplace and personal issues such as financial struggles. For example, inadequate workplace technology can cause stress and potentially negatively impact employee mental health, leading to retention issues.

Think about it. If you’re tasked with doing more, and your corporate technology (including support capabilities) is slowing you down, then you’re more likely to want to leave a role and perhaps the organization, even if your well-being is still okay. 

Returning to the importance of employee experiences

Employee experiences (with IT) not only affect employee “happiness,” they also impact productivity (as shown by the HappySignals data) and can be a contributing factor to employee well-being and retention issues. Along with the potential for employee retention issues, employee experience issues can also adversely impact the recruitment of new staff – thanks to the ability of potential employees to research what existing employees think of their employers online (or via more traditional networking).

These areas aren’t discrete, either. For example, employee well-being issues can impact productivity, including related absenteeism. As do retention and recruitment issues, whether a team is understaffed or there’s a loss of productivity caused by a new recruit “getting up to speed” in their new role. 

All of these issues, caused by poor employee experiences, ultimately affect business operations and outcomes adversely. So, returning to the blog’s title, employee experience is about far more than happy employees. Of course, unhappy employees (including those with well-being issues) are hopefully not something any organization wants. But the business impact of poor employee experiences can’t be overlooked, too.  

So, how is your organization currently assessing its employee experiences (whether at an IT or corporate level)? It might measure some symptoms, such as mental health/well-being and retention/recruitment issues. But even with mechanisms such as exit interviews, it can still be blind to the root cause or causes that ultimately need to be addressed. 

To address the underlying issues, IT organizations need to understand the importance of technology to employee experiences and the associated impact on employee productivity, well-being, and retention when it’s not meeting employee and business needs. 

What are your thoughts on employee experience measurement and how best to avoid the many unwanted consequences of poor employee experiences? Let me know your thoughts in the comments.