In looking at top trends for recruitment, employee experience is number one, according to a report. But how it's defined, and how it can be improved, are still a challenge
When it comes to the top trends that are changing the way employers hire and retain talent, employee experience easily tops the list.
That’s according to a recent report by LinkedIn that found that 94 per cent of talent professionals globally feel employee experience is “very important” to the future of recruiting.
Further down the list are people analytics (85 per cent), internal recruiting (82 per cent) and the multigenerational workforce (74 per cent), found the report, which combined survey results from more than 7,000 talent professionals in 35 countries, LinkedIn behavioural data and interviews with 40 experts.
With a tighter labour market, employers are competing for talent, and candidates are looking for employers where they can grow their career, gain help with their purpose in life or develop their skills, says Chris Brown, director of talent solutions at LinkedIn in Toronto.
There's definitely been a power shift, he says.
“The general, unwritten or unspoken narrative was, when you're an employer, ‘What can you do for me when I hire you?’ That's definitely shifted to… ‘What is your company doing for me and my career?’”
Focus on retention
In the HR space, employee experience may feel like an unwieldy topic, says Brown, but an easy way to understand it is to say it involves the four Ps: people (relationships, interactions), place (physical workspace, flexible work options), product (the work itself, matching skills and tasks) and process (how work gets done and is rewarded).
“Engagement is the end goal — employee experience is the means to get those employees to become engaged,” he says.
Not surprisingly, more than three-quarters (77 per cent) of companies are focusing on employee experience to increase retention, found the survey. Other reasons include increasing employee productivity (71 per cent), meeting the expectations of millennials and generation Z (40 per cent) and attracting more candidates (29 per cent), found LinkedIn.
It’s the employee experiences that drives the employer brand, says Brown.
“At the same time, if employee experience is strong, I'm more likely to stay at my job I feel like I'm invested in, I'm comfortable with work-life balance, I feel included at work — all these types of things, which are big topics, but they're all connected to my health and well-being and work meaning.”
For 20 years, employers have looked strategically at how to improve customer experience and customer retention, says Josh Bersin, president and co-founder of Bersin & Associates in Oakland, Calif.
“Now, companies are saying, ‘Wow, maybe we should do all that for our employees,’” he says. “In every single industry, there's an awakening going on that ‘If we don't make the employees’ lives better, we cannot possibly achieve our business goals.’”
Employee experience is about an individual who feels whole, says Ilana Hechter, a partner and leader of talent strategy and transformation at Mercer in Toronto.
“They can bring their whole selves to work, they can align with the purpose of the organization, they feel that they are welcomed and embraced, for whatever that definition for them means,” she says. “An individual that has a positive experience will perform better, will be more productive, will seek to be more collaborative, will feel able to raise ideas, be more innovative — these are all very correlated concepts.”
Improving the employee experience
While two-thirds (68 per cent) of employers say the employee experience has improved over the past five years, only half (52 per cent) say the experience is positive, found the LinkedIn survey.
One big problem? One in three companies do not regularly act on employee feedback, says LinkedIn. Other roadblocks for Canada include: a limited budget (64 per cent), not enough time (63 per cent), not enough people dedicated to the cause (53 per cent), it’s not prioritized by leadership (39 per cent) and they can’t justify the investment (26 per cent).
Listening to employees, and acting on that feedback, is probably the most important step, says Brown.
“Disengagement is seven times more likely if employees don't feel like that feedback is being acted upon... If you ask too many things and get too much feedback, you risk falling into that category of not acting.”
The biggest issue that holds companies back is not listening, says Bersin.
“When the employees speak up, they're usually right,” he says. “It's the same discipline as listening to customers… I think the reason this is not intuitively obvious is [because], in a lot of managers' minds, employees are the labour and they do as they're told — and that's just out of date.”
When it comes to the areas that need improvement for employee experience in Canada, the stats are uniform across different areas: ongoing employee training and simplified administrative processes (both 46 per cent), compensation and benefits and flexible work arrangements (both 45 per cent) and work-life balance (43 per cent).
It's a complex problem because some of the benefits that appear to improve the employee experience may not, such as pay, says Bersin.
“You could raise people’s wages, you could give them better benefits, you could come up with a bunch of new offices and have free food and unlimited vacation — you can do all those things — but if your managers are mean, it may not have as much impact as you thought.”
Another part of the employee experience is hiring the right people, he says.
“If you're a very demanding, high-performing 24-7 kind of a company, you have to select people that like that. If you get the wrong people in the company, they're not going to be happy. So, it affects the whole brand of the internal talent.”
One tip? Don’t throw out the past, says Hechter.
“There is this tendency, when you get into focusing on the experience, that we need to change everything,” she says. “There's a reason why organizations have been successful and much of their legacy strengths need to be maintained. Maybe they need to be refreshed somewhat, but there are cultural characteristics that need to be maintained.”
Another way to enhance the experience is cultivating transparency, and that’s about: How are people promoted? Why are certain people identified more so than others? How are decisions made within the organization? says Hechter.
“Individuals are asking to understand more because it's through that understanding that they can identify for themselves that they're aligned with the value if they understand the purpose, if they're aligned with that future vision — that is a huge piece of how people experience your organization.”
But a big risk is when employers are looking to HR to drive the employee experience, she says.
“HR does not in any way, shape or form own the employee experience; in fact, it's the leaders in the business that own the experience — HR is just a facilitator.”
WHY INVEST IN EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE?
77% Increase employee retention
71% Increase employee productivity
40% Meet expectations of millennials and gen Z
29% Attract more candidates
Source: LinkedIn
