Let’s just take a moment to look at our everyday lives.
You wake up to the alarm on your phone that’s set to your preferred volume and snooze times, drink that new coffee you ordered based on an online ad, listen to the playlist Spotify suggested on the drive to work while following the map that Google or Apple Maps has saved as your frequent destination.
From the time you wake up to the time you reach your office, almost every action has been personalized, tailored to your preferences.
So why should it be any different once you walk through the office doors?
In the workplace, personalized employee experience means understanding the unique needs, preferences, and aspirations of each employee and using those insights to deliver a work experience that is optimal for them in every way.
The workplaces of today as well as the people who populate them online or offline are complex and dynamic. Millennials and Gen Z are increasingly accounting for a larger percentage of the workforce, and they are accustomed to personalization as a natural part of their lives, not a luxury. They are willing to put in their best effort for an employer but expect reciprocation. They’ve also grown up in a world of choices, which means it’s important for employers to understand their needs to attract and retain the best talent.
Clearly, it’s time to retire the ‘To Whomsoever it May Concern’ approach. And about time too, because a personalized employee experience brings with it a host of benefits for you as an HR manager and for your organization.
Here are some of the ways in which a personalized employee experience can be a gamechanger!
1. Better for Business
2. Increase Employee Engagement
3. Get Valuable Insights
4. Boost Employee Retention
5. Make Work a Better Place
1. Better for Business
What’s best for your employees, is also great for your business.
According to a recent study by KPMG, companies that invest in employee experiences enjoy four times higher profitability than their competitors. Not just that, companies with highly engaged employees outperform their competitors by a staggering 147%.
Personalized employee experiences help employers and employees work in tandem. When an organization becomes an ally for any problems or obstacles that might stand in the way of an employee's performance and growth, the latter becomes motivated to give their very best to their work. This translates to tangible profits and can go a long way in terms of attracting the best talent.
As an HR manager, you can personalize employee experiences through the entire journey of an employee by doing the following:
- At the candidate stage- Create meaningful engagement, and get valuable information about their personalities, ambitions and needs through candidate management programs.
- Through onboarding- Use digitized onboarding processes to create a positive, personalized experience for the new hire to fit seamlessly into their role and the organization.
- As the employee grows- schedule regular check-ins, transparent and comprehensive appraisals, and steady support for any personal or professional challenges to maximize productivity.
- When the employee decides to move on- A strong alumni network and personalized experiences such as regular communication, niche events, and easy access can lead to a rich system of rehires, referrals, and brand building via word-of-mouth.
2. Increase Employee Engagement
Employee engagement is, essentially, how committed and connected an employee feels to the organization he/she works at, and the bigger the organization, the harder this is to achieve organically.
Find out: How Tydy helped Unilever increased employee engagement by 89%
Engaged employees tend to take more interest and put in more effort at work and hold themselves up to high standards of quality. Because they feel invested in the company’s growth and wellbeing.
In fact, employee retention is 36% higher at organizations with highly engaged employees.
This is only possible if they feel a more personal connection with the company they work for.
Some of the ways in which you can build employee engagement are:
- Regular, real-time evaluations
- Rewards for good performance
- Talent mobility programs to optimize employees’ skills
- Provide opportunities for learning and growth through workshops, collaborations, and upskilling programs
3. Get Valuable Insights
Personalized employee experiences can help an organization understand what makes its employees tick.
Especially if you are an HR manager, personalization through digital onboarding, pulse surveys, and polls can provide invaluable data and insights to answer questions like:
- What do employees like or dislike about the company?
- How do they see themselves growing in the organization?
- Are they feeling any discontent or frustration?
- What are their expectations from the you and the employer?
These insights can be used to tailor communication, create initiatives, and formulate strategies for attracting and retaining top-notch talent. They can also help in making decisions about what benefits to invest in, what gaps to bridge, and ultimately, how to create employee happiness.
4. Boost Employee Retention
Attrition has been a pain point for large companies for quite some time now. This study found that over 37.9% employees exited their organization within the first year and 2 out of every 3 employees who leave in the first year do so in the first six months.
This is partly because good, skilled employees have plenty of options when it comes to changing jobs. In fact, 40Mpeople search for jobs on LinkedIn each week. With the COVID-19 pandemic forcing a work from home revolution, even geography has become irrelevant in job searches.
So, the big question is - how do you ensure your employees aren’t out there shopping for offers?
Well, here are some answers:
- Make sure they know they are valued
- Recognize their hard work and achievements
- Provide support for personal issues
- Create opportunities for growth
- Maintain clear communication
Employees that feel engaged are likely to take a genuine, personal interest in the company’s growth and progress. If they’re that invested, they’ll usually stay.
5. Make Work a Better Place
Personalized employee experiences can help you create healthy and productive workspaces, where every employee feels happy to come into work every day, foster teamwork, think innovatively, and aspire to grow.
You can become a partner in their journey within the organization. As yet another generation enters the workforce, this culture of caring will become increasingly important because the workplaces of the future are going to look very different from what we’ve been used to.
In a post-pandemic world, workplaces will have to balance hybrid structures where some employees work from home, and some come into office. Meanwhile, as social media creates more social awareness, people are increasingly unabashed about who they are, be it identifying on the LBTQI+ spectrum, calling out inequality or vociferously supporting the causes they care about.
Offices and workspaces are quickly becoming microcosms, representative of the brave new world we live in. So now HR managers and leaders have a responsibility to shape the organizational culture to reflect this. Personalization is just one way of celebrating our uniqueness while bringing everyone together to achieve a common goal of growth and progress.
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