Open book Employee experience Why, when organisations understand that customers live in the 21st century, does so much of life in the workplace seem stuck in the past? Marketing can help bring it up to date E mployees are a core asset of any organisation, but if you dont strive to make peoples experiences within a company better, how do you expect them to go above and beyond to create impact for you? This is the challenge set out by Anand Verma, chief executive of Brilliant Basics, a global design and product studio that, since 2017, has been part of Infosys, the global technology services and consulting corporation. Vermas work at the intersection of technology, marketing and digital has led to the realisation that when these different parts of the business remain siloed, a disconnect happens that has an impact on employees and, ultimately, the customer. Everyone knows how pervasive digital is in our modern world, he says, but there is a dichotomy. While were getting better at taking care of consumers, we forget to take care of our employees. They also experience this digital world, outside of the organisation. However, within, they often have to make do with an archaic intranet, or dont have the digital tools to make their working lives better, faster or more efficient. The basic consumer-led technologies are often missing from working life. Unsurprisingly, the companies Verma identifies as actively working to tackle the dichotomy are what he terms new age but not every organisation has the resources of Google or Facebook, or can be as nimble as a start-up. However, whatever a companys size or sector, he believes it is vital to remember that employees are also customers. He says: Marketers must put themselves in their employees shoes, and focus on the basics, in order to redefine experiences and make life in the workplace better. Leading market research company Forrester reports that making your employee base more efficient has a direct impact on profit margins. And this really counts with the millennial and Generation Z demographics, who have grown up digitally native. You cant tell them that they cant bring their mobiles to work, or that they cant have a good work-life balance. The workplace shouldnt feel alien and restrictive, so dont ask them to live double lives. Companies need policies that allow employees to bring whats happening in the outside world into the workplace. Verma says that across sector verticals, where once employees had to adapt to organisations, now managers and organisations are adapting to employee needs. There is a paradigm shift happening. As the workforce evolves, employees expect greater experiences. A lot of organisations are still working with very old technology; or staff are working in small cubicles; or the structure of the organisation is very hierarchical, rather than flat and this isnt what the workforce experiences everywhere else. At Brilliant Basics, Verma has developed a strategy for employee experience based on three core pillars: The link between employee and customer experience 1. Digital work experience This looks at how artificial intelligence, personalisation and content can be integrated into employee experience. Consider a mother-tobe. Does she want to wade through reams of documents to find out what the company maternity policy means to her? Of course not. Verma believes content can play a major role in giving contextualised information in a personalised way. Why cant the tone be more supportive, he asks. Its an opportunity to create a strong bond between the organisation and the employee. Does your digital landscape support such opportunities? Could people working at home book annual leave by asking Google Home or Alexa? How can technology help improve these experiences and remove friction? 2. Physical work experience WeWork, the shared workspace company, is one of the fastest-growing real estate businesses in the UK. Half of the space they operate is shared, communal spaces, says Verma. People dont want to work at their desks all the time, they want sofas and quiet spaces, and spaces for collaboration and creativity to unfold. Can technology, he asks, help make the architecture of a workspace more useful for employees? 3. Emotional work experience People want to feel included, supported and empowered, says Verma. How do you cultivate wellbeing to create a stronger emotional bond between individual employees and the organisation? A lot of money goes into on-boarding, but if you dont have a good first experience with the brand there is a greatly increased probability that people will leave within a year. Vermas advice is that the positive emotional experience of work must be evident from the outset. The key take-away for marketers, is that with employees, as with customers, the experience is the brand. The people who work in your organisation should be your trailblazers, Verma says. If theyre not, what chance do you have? cim.co.uk/exchange Anand Verma works at the intersection of marketing and tech