Make the Employee Experience Easy to Buy, Use, and Share
Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
I must admit that I was a late adopter to the concept of paying for stuff with your watch (i.e., Apple Pay or Google Pay type services). But during the pandemic, I had to learn how to use it and now, I’m a fan. Primarily because it makes things “easy to buy and easy to use”.
When I worked in hospitality, we would mention during customer service training that mantra of making things “easy to buy and easy to use”. It was all about making the customer experience (yes, you guessed it) easy and effortless. We talked about reducing barriers to purchase, speeding up delivery of the product, making upselling suggestions, and finding ways to educate customers about how to use the product effectively.
I still remember that mantra today. It’s frustrating sometimes how hard it is to give organizations money. When I’m frustrated with a customer experience, I find myself saying, “I’m trainable and trying to be a good customer. Tell me what I’m supposed to do.”
The same is true with the employee experience. It should be “easy to buy and use” as well. And in today’s technology driven society; it might make sense to add “easy to share”. Here’s how we can apply the “easy to buy and use” concept to the employee experience.
“Easy to buy” means having a company culture where employees feel they are welcomed, valued, and supported. It’s about employees “buying into” the organization. Granted, no company is perfect, but that doesn’t mean employees can’t feel like they are an integral part of the operation and a contributor to the bottom-line.
“Easy to use” refers to creating policies and procedures that help move the organization forward. It’s about only creating policies when necessary. And those policies or guidelines can be easily located and understood. I believe most employees understand that workplace rules are necessary and important. We just have to be careful not to overdo it.
“Easy to share” is focused on designing a company culture and workplace rules that can be explained by anyone. When I think of new hire buddy programs, it occurs to me that for them to be successful, employees need to be able to explain those unwritten rules to each other. If the only people who can answer questions are HR and management, there might be a problem.
Employees have choices when it comes to their jobs. If they like the experience, then they will stay. And if they don’t, well…then they’ll probably leave. Organizations should consider have a focused conversation about their employee experience, so employees choose them. And that choice should be easy to make.
Image captured by Sharlyn Lauby while exploring the streets of Orlando, FL
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