{"id":2054,"date":"2021-01-20T15:02:15","date_gmt":"2021-01-20T15:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/susanknodel.com\/non-classifiee\/why-you-should-apply-design-thinking-to-the-employee-experience\/"},"modified":"2021-01-20T15:02:31","modified_gmt":"2021-01-20T15:02:31","slug":"why-you-should-apply-design-thinking-to-the-employee-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/employee-experience-fr\/why-you-should-apply-design-thinking-to-the-employee-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"Why you should apply Design Thinking to the Employee Experience"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Illustration by yangwenshuang<\/p>\n

COVID-19 has forced changes in the way people work \u2014 and created a once-in-a-generation opportunity to increase engagement and productivity.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The tools of talent management \u2014 hiring, on-boarding, performance reviews \u2014 are changing, some for now, others for good.\u00a0Teamwork, collaboration, and tacit knowledge-sharing have also been disrupted. The mere fact that many people\u00a0are\u00a0separated\u00a0from friends and colleagues, which can strain their relationships,\u00a0is a big deal: Affirmative answers to the question \u201cDo you have a best friend at work?\u201d consistently correlate with higher employee retention, better customer metrics, increased productivity, and greater profitability,\u00a0according to Gallup.<\/p>\n

Quite simply, work is different today. The COVID-19 pandemic has upended workplace routines and destroyed norms. Team rooms have become Zoom rooms.\u00a0Gone are the informal chats in the hallway or by the coffee machine. Bullpens and hoteling designs are out, private offices are in, off-sites are over, and business travel has gone bust.\u00a0Many people will\u00a0work from home\u00a0much or all of the time for the foreseeable future. For the jobs in which this is not possible, employees are working split shifts and companies are redesigning work teams and work spaces to make health and safety easier to manage.<\/p>\n

Amid all these changes, what\u2019s too often missing is an overarching plan to design a better\u00a0employee experience<\/em>. That broad term encompasses daily activity (what it\u2019s like to work somewhere), productivity (getting things done), values and culture (what makes work meaningful), and career (learning, advancing, growing).\u00a0In our previous\u00a0strategy<\/em>+business<\/em>\u00a0article, we wrote about how businesses should rethink their customer experience in the age of COVID-19. But these turbulent times also represent a great opportunity to redesign \u2014 or, in some cases, do a first design of \u2014 the employee experience. Indeed, the two go hand in hand: In an economy increasingly dominated by services, employee experience and customer experience are inextricably linked.<\/p>\n

Moreover, study after study shows that a superior employee experience confers business benefits, just as an excellent customer experience does. Attraction, retention, engagement, productivity, and profit all rise as employee experience improves. In the\u00a0Thrive XM Index<\/a>, which ranks companies by \u201cemployee well-being,\u201d companies that placed in the top 10 percent outperformed peers in the Fortune 500 by EBITDA margin and return on equity in the second quarter of 2020.<\/p>\n

Designing the employee experience goes beyond figuring out how to make remote work possible and palatable or how to make work sites safer. So how do company leaders create the magic? The design-thinking mindset and tool kit that produce better customer experience can do the same for employees. We\u2019ll draw on what we call the SPICE (segments, promises, innovation, coherence, and efficiency) principles to demonstrate how companies can attract and keep good people, help them do their jobs better, and ensure that their behavior aligns with the company\u2019s value proposition \u2014 all of which will help restart growth and restore profits.<\/p>\n

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Segments: Find and keep the right employees by redesigning talent planning.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

In many companies, talent planning \u2014 strategy, hiring, training, assessment \u2014 is reactive, taking place after business unit plans and budgets are completed. This year, don\u2019t wait. Asking who your \u201cright\u201d employee is has become as important as asking who your \u201cright\u201d customer is, because the answer might have changed in several respects.<\/p>\n

For example, you may need employees with\u00a0different skills, and you must consider whether those new skills will be needed only in the short term or will be part of a permanent change. The outgoing, bubbly person who staffed an in-person retail environment may be less critical now than a tech-savvy introvert who can run A\/B tests on your website all day long. You may need to recruit from a variety of talent pools and deliver training through new channels. If you have a high-potentials program, it will have to be redesigned. Supervisors will require new tools and new coaching.<\/p>\n

Also important: You might need to evaluate whether your best people \u2014 folks who get your values and have the skills central to your value proposition \u2014 are struggling, and how to help them if they are. We talked to a partner in a Philadelphia-area law firm who said his firm\u2019s associates and researchers weren\u2019t faring as well with a work-from-home arrangement as the partners were, possibly because the junior staff relied more heavily on one another for informal collaboration and learning than seasoned staff did.<\/p>\n

His immediate solution was to get people back to the office. But that was a patch, not a fix. Imposed from the top, it didn\u2019t recognize some employees\u2019 practical problems with working at the office (parents of young children attending school in a virtual or hybrid model, for example) or the anxiety others might have. What was really needed was a rethink and redesign of the learning-by-doing model that professional-services firms rely on to develop the next generation of partners.<\/p>\n

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Promises: Reset your expectations of employees and their expectations of you.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

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A\u00a0study<\/a>\u00a0by Ohio State University\u2019s National Center for the Middle Market (where one of this article\u2019s authors worked) shows that high-performing cultures have one thing in common: They highlight what employees can control and do rather than stressing what they cannot or should not do. That is, they give employees clear expectations and the power to meet them. That combination drives both productivity and satisfaction.<\/p>\n

Job descriptions, employee handbooks, performance reviews, goals, incentive plans \u2014 all of these are part of setting expectations. So are undocumented, day-to-day routines \u2014 the behaviors shown, seen, and absorbed at work. But many traditional expectations are no longer realistic. \u201cWe\u2019re reexamining all our job descriptions and deliverables, especially for remote workers,\u201d says the CEO of a Kansas aerospace company. After all, you can\u2019t expect a consistent nine-to-five workday when schools are remote or have adopted hybrid models or when workers are suddenly sidelined by sickness or the need to quarantine.<\/p>\n

Any redesign should begin with explicit expectations. Job descriptions, for example, should focus more on outcomes than activities. Now is not the time to simply roll out last year\u2019s performance-review templates.\u00a0Numerous companies\u00a0are changing the way they conduct such reviews. Among the steps some have taken: encouraging more informal and more frequent conversations between managers and employees; scrapping reviews for all or part of 2020 (Twitter is doing the former; Facebook did the latter); and looking at altering the goals and metrics against which people are judged.<\/p>\n

But implicit promises need rethinking, too. How should mentoring happen when people aren\u2019t together in the office? What should employees\u2019 expectations be for career paths, promotions, and job security, when so many plans have been overturned by force majeure?<\/p>\n

In addition, some implicit promises may need to be made explicit. In many work environments, technology and the ability to communicate 24\/7 have made the barriers between work and home fuzzy. Now may be a time to set firmer barriers that allow your employees to feel they can make a mental separation between work and home, even if they can\u2019t make a physical one. Employers that offer\u00a0the highest wages,\u00a0snazziest\u00a0offices, or most prestige may no longer have an advantage over those that\u00a0promise empathy, security, and authenticity. Cool is fine.\u00a0But\u00a0right now, warm may be\u00a0better.<\/p>\n

Now may be a time to set firmer barriers that allow your employees to feel they can make a mental separation between work and home, even if they can\u2019t make a physical one.<\/p>\n

Other promises, such as cleanliness, candor, and compliance, may become much more important. Whereas they were once considered a simple, standard part of the office experience, these elements might now be matters of life and death. \u201cThere\u2019s still too much we don\u2019t know about putting people back into the workplace for us to feel like we can do it responsibly,\u201d says one chief operating officer who oversees some 130 workplaces around the country, ranging from small sites in strip malls to multiple floors in metropolitan skyscrapers. Safety is both a fact and a perception: \u201cWe\u2019ve spent literally millions of dollars to make our workplaces safe and hygienic, but I\u2019m more worried about the optics of asking people to go back to the office,\u201d she admits.<\/p>\n

Transparency and honesty are more critical than ever. \u201cPeople understand lack of certainty, and they\u2019ll forgive that,\u201d says one workplace consultant. \u201cWhat they won\u2019t forgive is dodging the issue, fudging the truth, or ignoring people\u2019s concerns.\u201d Some large employers \u2014\u00a0Ohio State\u00a0is one \u2014 maintain COVID-19 dashboards of key health statistics. They\u2019re not unlike the visual control dashboards familiar to managers and staff at well-run factories.<\/p>\n

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Innovation: Experiment, experiment, experiment \u2014 then capture what you learn.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

Policies and processes can all get stale. Companies that were steadfast in the belief and practice that employees had to work from the office were forced to abandon that conviction abruptly. It seems that after bumps and starts, many are pleasantly surprised at how well remote work is going and are considering sticking with it for longer than they\u2019d originally planned. What\u2019s important here is not that companies went remote \u2014 after all, that was a matter of necessity. What\u2019s important is for them to figure out why it\u2019s working and use the example as a rationale for examining other articles of faith.<\/p>\n

Some might argue that this is the wrong time to try new things, given the day-to-day stress people are experiencing. In fact, it\u2019s an ideal time. Says Keith Ferrazzi, a leadership and organizational coach, \u201cWe shouldn\u2019t be talking just about how to get people back to the office, or just about how to make work-from-home productive. We should be rethinking how to do the work and involving employees in the process.\u201d Study the improvisations and work-arounds your employees have been using. What\u2019s working for them? For you? What should be scaled up?<\/p>\n

Consider self-management: For 70 years,\u00a0researchers have known\u00a0that self-managed teams often do better work than closely supervised ones; COVID-19 might do more to expand the practice than anything else has. Last year, Walmart tried out a new structure at Sam\u2019s Club and Walmart Neighborhood Markets that involved cross-training teams and making them responsible for managing stock and keeping shelves looking good, according to Dacona Smith, chief operating officer at Walmart U.S.,\u00a0in an interview\u00a0with the\u00a0Detroit News<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Bas du formulaire<\/p>\n

Now, Smith went on, Walmart supercenters will be rolling out a similar structure. He expects both productivity and employee experience to benefit. \u201cThrough this new, tiered structure for team leads, we\u2019re creating room for pay and career growth while investing in areas like pickup and delivery as customers increasingly turn to those options,\u201d Smith said. The move speaks to the importance of innovation for both customers and employees, and the symbiotic nature of customer experience and employee experience.<\/p>\n

Keeping things as they are for the sake of it is pointless; so is innovation without a good reason. Make the distinction between improvisation \u2014 what you\u2019ve been forced to do by circumstance, making it up as you go along \u2014 and thoughtful change. Solicit feedback widely and have some method for capturing and assessing it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Coherence: Make sure that employees see how their work fits into the larger picture, and that they all feel they are working for the same company.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

Boundaries, silos, and bungled handoffs are not only a problem for customers; they upset employees, too. They make for duplicative work, increase the chance for error, and make employees feel alienated and unappreciated. Often the problem is siloed information. For example, a\u00a0survey by PrecisionLender, which makes software that helps bankers price loans, found that 46 percent of bankers believe they don\u2019t have full visibility into a customer relationship when making a loan decision.<\/p>\n

The pandemic has revealed and exacerbated many companies\u2019 lack of coherence. The exigencies of managing remote work have revealed instance after instance of weak process design. Before COVID-19, it was possible to cover up for poor processes or lack of knowledge-sharing by running down the hall to get the answer to a question. Now, having to do the equivalent remotely or when work schedules are uncertain is exponentially more difficult.<\/p>\n

Tools such as customer journey maps can be turned inward to chart the steps employees take to get work done: who assigns them work, what tools and resources they need, whom they hand work off to. You can also use process maps, which more typically measure the flow of material or paperwork, to show what people have to do at each point in a process. Like customers on the outside, \u201cinternal customers\u201d have changed today. This is a good time to write (or rewrite) service-level agreements between business units and functions such as IT, human resources, and finance \u2014 again, involving employees in the process.<\/p>\n

Using traditional customer journey tools can also reveal any cultural dissonance in the company. Nobody expects the communications team and the compliance team to function exactly the same way in a financial-services firm, for example, but people from different departments shouldn\u2019t feel as though they work at different companies. \u201cWhen people are working across departments, disparities in attitude, focus, and approach can create a range of problems, from unnecessarily prolonging projects to resentment,\u201d notes a former chief risk officer at a health insurer. \u201cIf these disparities aren\u2019t addressed, the teams won\u2019t be able to work together any better in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Efficiency: Make it easier for employees to do their jobs.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

Work is more satisfying when it is less of a hassle. Efficiency isn\u2019t just about time; it\u2019s about time well spent. Is it easy for people to do their jobs? If not, what is getting in the way? In a pre-pandemic\u00a0Qualtrics survey, employees cited inefficient processes as the number one obstacle to their productivity. The pandemic has added to the burden, sometimes in an unexpected manner. \u201cWorking from home is great in lots of ways,\u201d a financial planner told us, \u201cbut my work space is less efficient, I haven\u2019t got all the tools I\u2019m used to, the VPN is slow, and tech support is a pain.\u201d<\/p>\n

There have been conflicting studies about pandemic productivity among the workforce, with\u00a0some showing it increasing and some the opposite. But the real point isn\u2019t productivity as measured in output per hour; it\u2019s whether the work arrangements and the workplace design \u2014 virtual or not \u2014 make it harder or easier for employees to do their job.<\/p>\n

Enhance the employee experience by making sure employees have not only the right tools and equipment\u00a0but also the right information, the right level of empowerment, and the right access to colleagues and higher authority. Many companies conduct annual employee engagement or satisfaction surveys. Our advice: Throw them out, at least for now.<\/p>\n

What you need now is a steady series of short pulse surveys and conversations that ask employees to name their three biggest time wasters or other headaches. Focus on tools (\u201cDo you have what you need?\u201d), authority (\u201cAre you empowered to make decisions?\u201d or \u201cIs it easy to get approvals?\u201d), and distractions (\u201cWhat pulls you away from the task at hand?\u201d). Turn those answers into a Pareto chart, start working the list, and come back the following month to get new insights.<\/p>\n

Just as you\u00a0can\u2019t\u00a0improve customer experience by holding \u201ccustomer-centricity week\u201d rallies, you can\u2019t strengthen employee experience with a series of sympathetic emails. A better experience is the result of a coordinated set of thoughtful, intentional actions. A positive employee experience enables your people to\u00a0do<\/em>\u00a0a good job and helps them feel that they\u00a0have<\/em>\u00a0a good job. Should it have taken a crisis like COVID-19 to make companies aware of this? No, but the pandemic has created an imperative that companies literally can\u2019t afford to ignore.<\/p>\n

Source: Thomas Stewart (Former executive director of the National Center for the Middle Market at Ohio State University) and Patricia O’Connell (President of Aerten Consulting, a New York City based firm that works with companies to devise content strategies and develop thought leadership for top management)<\/p>\n

(https:\/\/www.strategy-business.com\/blog\/Why-you-should-apply-design-thinking-to-the-employee-experience?gko=62d06)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Illustration by yangwenshuang COVID-19 has forced changes in the way people work \u2014 and created a once-in-a-generation opportunity to increase engagement and productivity. The tools of talent management \u2014 hiring, on-boarding, performance reviews \u2014 are changing, some for now, others for good.\u00a0Teamwork, collaboration, and tacit knowledge-sharing have also been disrupted. The mere fact that many […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2054"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2054"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2054\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2056,"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2054\/revisions\/2056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2054"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susanhonjo.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}