You’re the CEO. Can you run your business alone? Can you serve your clients as well as Mary in the customer service team that has been working with your company for the past three years? Can you deal with customer complaints and always turn them into a positive experience as Jason in your complaints department?
Now, let me pose another question – would you do for Mary and Jason, all the things that you are asking them to do for your customers? Let’s face it, in most of the scenarios you wouldn’t.
There is a common misconception that your employees are there to carry out your orders as you want them to be carried out, because they are paid for it. Unfortunately, times change and for a good few years now, people will change jobs as they change clothes, sometimes not even taking the pay into consideration.
Anxiety, high stress levels and demotivating surroundings are simply not worth it. If they are not getting recognised, listened to and trusted, they will not want to have anything to do with your business.
Lack of trust, training and transparency are among the biggest reasons for high employee turnover and all companies have to start realising that not caring for the EX will cost – a lot.
What is Employee Experience?
The CX Academy defines Employee Experience as how employees feel about all of the interactions they have with your organisation. Their feelings begin developing right from the moment that they see the job advertisement (maybe even before that if you are a large international company) up to the time they receive a call from HR asking why they left and their experience during the work.
The Positives of Investing in Employee Experience
MIT Research found that brands with strong EX are 25% more profitable than the ones who are lacking in this area. Positive Employee Experience directly translates to a higher profit for your company. This happens through reducing costs associated with high employee turnover and improved profitability through great EX.
Reduce costs
Training
Every time you recruit new employees you have to train them. Even if they are an expert in the field, time is required to bring them up to speed with the way processes are carried out in your company and everyone knows that time means money.
So all the time you have to spend training new recruits could be used to upskill and improve the employees you already have or to design better CX solutions for your customers.
Moreover, Training Magazine reports that in 2017 it cost $1,075 to train a single employee on average. The rise in online-led training has to be taken into account, however this figure shows that training costs do add up to a sum that makes a real difference to your profit at the end of the year.
Absenteeism
If your company is suffering from employee absenteeism, it is highly likely that the reason for it is your poor EX.
The main causes for absenteeism are:
- Minor illness
- Workplace bullying or harassment
- Mental Health Issues
- Major illness
- Team & Management Issues
- Commuting Issues.
Most of these reasons can be directly linked to poor Employee Experience. Absenteeism increases the workload for other employees which is demotivating. It affects the whole company so it should be recognised and dealt with as soon as possible.
Recruitment
Just as with training costs, when your turnover decreases as you improve your EX, your recruitment costs will decrease too.
In 2022, the average cost per hire in the USA was $4,000. These costs vary depending on your company size, industry and how often you hire new employees. There’s no doubt however that the more employees you hire in a year the higher your recruitment costs.
You can calculate your Cost per Hire using the formula below.
Work Environment
Employees subjected to rude customers, perform poorly, feel angry and psychologically distressed. When you invest in CX your customer satisfaction rate is going to improve. The same thing happens when you invest in EX.
When your employees are happy at work, and believe in the company product and service, they will be more likely to perform well and serve your customers as best as they can. When this isn’t the case the very opposite will happen.
In either case, a spiral situation is bound to take place, where one will affect another. Ultimately it is up to yourself, and if you are willing to invest in the right areas of your business to increase both customer and employee experience.
Improved Profitability
Employee clarity and alignment increases their impact in the role
Company culture is one of the most important factors in creating great Employee Experience. If the company culture is well established and positive, it can improve employee productivity, engagement and overall experience.
According to Possibleworks, “When an organization promotes a culture of transparency, has clear expectations, provides continuous feedback, and offers the right recognition, employees can easily understand what is expected of them. A culture that allows employees to be open, honest, and independent nurtures efficiency and cooperation within teams.”
Culture can be seen as a backbone of a company’s profitability. If the culture focuses on the positive “can-do” attitude of the employees, they will be more likely to strive for success, leading your company to greater profitability.
Longer employee retention means a greater skillset and more longer-term relationships with your brand advocates
The longer your employees stay with you the more experience specific to your company they gather.
Every business has their own quirks and set of habits. Even your customer base can be very specific. Your employees will learn how to deal accordingly with your customers, to bring you your desired effects. They will also learn how the team works and the specifics of what their supervisor or team leader expects of them.
This is important because these things are not covered during training. Nobody is told that the team lead prefers to receive updates a day in advance or that customers from a specific region have to be approached more often to keep up the good relationship.
This is true especially in large corporate offices, where training is generalised and provided to large groups of new employees that end up working in different teams.
Employee advocacy yields better quality of new entrants
Just as your customers will tell their friends, family and the whole internet about their experience with your company, so will your employees. Checking other employee reviews of your company on Glassdoor has become a part of everybody’s job-search process. Since it’s anonymous, you can be sure that they will be exceptionally honest.
By providing great EX you are protecting your company from any negative reviews. Which in turn will spark an interest from highly skilled professionals to apply to your company. The more employees you can gain with experience in the correct field, the more likely that your business will become more profitable.
Now you see that by putting measures in place that ensure Mary and Jason have a great experience, can bring you a lot of profit.
Want to learn how to do it right?
Watch our Masterclass with Brian Horgan and Julian Douglas where they go over our framework and how it applies to Employee Experience.
If you would like to learn more about Customer Experience, enrol in our Professional Diploma or Certificate today.
