Building a Digital Employee Experience Strategy to Improve Retention

The rush for digitization during the pandemic has now slowed its frantic pace, giving companies time to consider the technology they’ve implemented and what their digital employee experience is like. However, there’s a discrepancy between what the C-suite thinks makes a good digital employee experience and what employees think. According to a survey by PWC, 90% of C-suite executives think their company pays attention to people’s needs when introducing new technology, but only 53% of employees agree.

Work technology can be one of the big retention factors to look out for. If tools are clunky, inefficient, and hard to learn, employees can become frustrated and disengage from their work, even looking to greener pastures.

This is where you in HR or L&D can help bridge that gap and create a digital employee experience that satisfies both company and employee needs. In this post, we’ll explain what we mean by “digital employee experience”, how to create a digital employee experience strategy, how your team leverages technology, and how the right work technology can ultimately create a more satisfied workforce.

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What is the digital employee experience?

First off, what is digital employee experience? At its core, the employee digital experience is how employees interact with the tech tools provided by their employer. Everything from communication and collaboration software to learning platforms and tools needed for everyday tasks. These interactions with tech and how the tools they use work together can really shape how satisfied employees feel in their roles, how productive they are, and the culture of the workplace overall.

Parts of the digital employee experience

These four areas are where employees interact with technology the most and working within these can help focus your efforts when forming your digital employee experience strategy.

So, let’s explore what makes up the digital employee experience.

1. Communication and engagement: Where and how your employees are communicating and connecting with each other such as Slack, Outlook, and Zoom but also mentorship software and employee engagement tools.
2. Task management: This could be as simple as to do list functions in employees’ email platform or as complex as project management or ticket management software.
3. Role-specific tools: These are where employees actually do their day to day tasks. Think of spreadsheets, design software, customer management and service tools, etc.‍
4. Employment management: This is where employees manage time off, benefits, professional development, and compensation. This could be an HRIS such as Bamboo or Dayforce.

Creating a digital employee experience strategy

Developing a digital employee experience strategy means taking a good look at the tech you have now and how everyone uses it. Making sure the tools are easy to use, accessible, and actually help employees do their jobs more efficiently is key. Let’s explore how to build a strategy that uses technology to improve employee experience.

Identifying employee tech needs

Getting a handle on what your employees really need from their work technology calls for a thoughtful and strategic approach. After all, 73% of people surveyed say they know of systems that would help them do their job better and faster. By having open and honest conversations with your team or giving managers tools to gather that feedback, you can get the real picture of the digital employee experience and start planning how to adjust or add new tools.

Here are a few ways you can identify needs as you start to form your digital employee experience strategy:

• Engage in open dialogue: Encourage open lines of communication where employees feel comfortable sharing feedback about their day-to-day technology use.
• Conduct surveys and focus groups: Regularly run surveys and organize focus groups to gather in-depth insights into the employee digital experience and how employees use each tool.
• Analyze usage patterns: Work with IT to review current technology usage statistics to spot trends and discover where tools are being underutilized or causing friction.
• Collect feedback on pain points: Actively seek out information on specific pain points employees encounter with existing systems to understand critical areas needing improvement.
• Encourage continuous feedback: Promote ongoing feedback loops to make sure employee needs are continuously assessed and addressed as they evolve.
• Show commitment to action: Demonstrate your commitment to using the feedback to make meaningful changes to the digital employee experience.

HR and L&D’s digital employee experience and how to use it for retention

Keeping top talent around means creating a space where they’re connected to their team and able to do their job well with the tools available to them. Your team can also use tech tools to explore the employee digital experience and dig up a lot of useful insights into how employees behave, how they communicate, and how they engage with their peers while uncovering what they need to stick around.

Here are some examples of how you in HR and L&D can build out your employee digital experience and leverage technology to improve employee experience, supporting your retention strategy:

HR analytics and data-driven decision-making

• Predictive analytics: Implementing HR analytics software with predictive capabilities can be a game-changer for keeping your team intact. By diving into patterns around things like job satisfaction, performance, and engagement, you can spot who might be gearing up to leave.
• Employee survey and feedback analysis: Using tools for employee feedback not only helps your workforce feel heard and like their voices matter, it helps you explore details about everything from workplace morale to how folks actually feel about their jobs or the tools they use to do it.
• Workforce planning tools: These tools help you perform a skills gap analysis, forecast hiring needs, and understand the impact of staff turnover on how your company operates—allowing your team to proactively manage your talent pipeline and reduce the impacts of turnover.

Platforms for recognition and feedback

• Recognition and rewards platforms: Tools like Bonusly, Workstars, or the Badges and Certificates feature in Together give employees and managers easy ways to celebrate achievements with public recognition and rewards.
• Continuous feedback tools: These tools help keep an ongoing dialogue between employees and managers about performance, goals, and growth outside of the traditional annual review process to better support employees.
• Learning management systems (LMS): Invest in an LMS that offers personalized learning and development for employees, such as Coursera or LinkedIn Learning. Professional development tools not only contribute to employee satisfaction and advancement, they allow your team to measure usage, achievements, and growth.

Platforms for mentorship and employee connections

• Traditional mentorship software: These tools facilitate matching employees with more senior peers. Platforms like Together’s mentoring software make it easy for mentors and mentees to connect and build meaningful relationships that not only improve both employees’ career trajectories, but improve feelings of commitment and engagement with their work.
• Peer mentor software: Peer learning software opens up a whole new avenue for growth by allowing employees to learn together, share their expertise, and build a culture of continuous development. Platforms like Together’s Colleague Connect help you create a peer mentor program that nurture a sense of community and belonging among team members.
• Spontaneous engagement tools: Spontaneous engagement tools like Donut or Together’s Coffee Chats help build relationships across the organization, encouraging informal interactions by randomly matching team members for virtual coffee chats. It gives employees that maybe normally wouldn’t interact a chance to connect over shared interests, cultivating a culture of camaraderie.

Enhancing retention through better digital employee experience

Focusing on how employees interact with tech in their day-to-day—or how your team uses tech for HR and L&D functions—can be a core part of your retention strategy. By gathering feedback and understanding which of those four areas of the employee digital experience needs work, you can help create an environment where employees feel their tech needs are taken seriously, empower them to do their jobs more efficiently, and create opportunities for them to connect with the company—boosting satisfaction and their commitment to their role.

Together’s suite of mentorship software, peer mentoring, and employee connection tools can help your company build a better digital employee experience by providing opportunities to connect with peers and grow, all while improving your team’s employee digital experience by lightening the administrative burden of mentorship and engagement initiatives.

Get started with Together today—book a demo!