foster a positive workplace with superior employee experience

A vibrant workplace thrives on positive employee relationships and exceptional employee engagement. Enabling a superior employee experience is foundational to cultivating a positive workplace. Aligning employees with your organization’s mission and values enhances employee retention, drives long-term productivity, and promotes sustainable growth.

With employee experience at the core of your talent strategy, what essential measures must you take to build teams that align with your business fundamentals and support your growth trajectory? This guide helps you explore areas of opportunity right from the talent marketing perspective to onboarding talent and facilitating a stellar employee experience.

personalize recruitment to boost employee experience

Your recruitment process not only determines your ability to find and hire talented workers but also talks volumes about your organization's culture. Every step of the recruitment journey shapes the perceptions of prospective employees. Embracing a human-centered approach right from the start can open the door to create a memorable employee experience.

To elevate the employee experience at every touch point, try implementing the suggestions listed below.

• make sure job descriptions are accurate; no one wants to waste time on unsuitable matches
• avoid lengthy applications, especially during the initial process
• check that your company’s career landing page is user-friendly, up-to-date and has workable links
• keep your applicants informed of where they are in the process, either through sending rejection notices, requesting more information or reaching out to schedule an interview

To craft an effective strategy for employee experience, it’s imperative to understand your employee journeys - the challenges and opportunities they encounter across various roles and ranks. Mapping these journeys allows you to accurately identify employee needs and categorize them into meaningful segments.

elevate onboarding

Onboarding plays a vital role in the employee experience, as it aims to smoothly integrate new hires into your organization. A well-executed onboarding program lays a positive foundation by providing new employees with the knowledge, training, and support required to excel as productive team members.

Gallup’s 2024 State of Global Workplace Report highlights that engaged employees have substantially higher hope for their future lives, leading to positive effects on the global economy. An exceptional employee experience is key to achieving such engagement.

Structured onboarding procedures ensure a smooth execution of every step in the journey, enabling consistency across the employee induction events. While you prepare to welcome employees at your office facility, hybrid and remote work setups can challenge your onboarding strategy. It’s crucial for you to stay adaptive to remote employee needs and engage with them effectively.

A productive onboarding session must include essentials such as the ones below.

• new hires will need to complete the required legal and payroll forms
• distribution of tech equipment and passwords or tokens should be prompt
• incremental training periods can prevent overwhelming the new employee — however, at the same time, you want them engaged from day one and not staring at a blank screen
• providing a mentor is a great way to help the new employee become acclimated with the layout of the building, understand how lunches and breaks are handled and meet an assortment of new colleagues
• scheduled sessions with a manager or HR representative can guarantee the new employee isn’t forgotten or excluded.

Nonetheless, to develop a streamlined onboarding experience strategy, consider collaborating with an HR solutions specialist such as Randstad. Our expert consultants are just a call away and partner with you to offer support and solutions aligned with your business needs.

invest in learning and development

The 2024 Randstad Employer Brand Research suggests that training ranked as the third most important motivator for employees to remain with an employer. Job seekers and employees, alike, seek career paths that provide challenges and ample growth opportunities. Investing in training allows you to identify high-performing employees and support them to develop their skills, fostering long-term work relationships.

Opportunities for growth and development enable employees to feel more secure in their jobs, reducing stress from technological advances. The 2024 State of the Global Workplace report highlights that robust job markets correlate with active employee engagement.

Research suggests that job and financial security are high priorities among workers. While workers feel confident that they can find another job, workforce resizing and the adoption of automation can cause job insecurity. Offering workers career coaching along with upskilling and reskilling opportunities can help employees and companies remain competitive.

Your organization probably has a variety of required training and safety classes, some annually. While these are necessary and beneficial, you should distinguish these types of courses from training and development opportunities. Making sure all your employees understand what training is available and how to access it is a critical role for the HR department.

show appreciation & offer a superlative employee experience

Offering rewards can help incentivize employees and let them know you value them. Rewards don’t have to be monetary, but money is always welcome, especially during periods of inflation. In fact, many employees hope their employer can provide some type of cost-of-living adjustment to help with financial worries.

In addition to monitoring your wage scale to ensure adequate compensation, consider the following non-monetary rewards as good working environment examples.

• flexible scheduling, including shift adjustments, time off and days worked
• remote work from home or in a hybrid model
• recognition through employee awards, callouts during meetings or in newsletters, or personal acknowledgments
• miscellaneous perks like upfront parking, corporate giveaways and the opportunity to choose between projects
• departmental rewards play a crucial role in improving morale and encouraging collaboration. Consider hosting catered meals, planning social activities, and extending break times

develop strong management

Too often, companies promote employees to managerial positions based on their experience or job performance alone. However, shifting the focus to skills and passion can make your staff feel empowered and included. Additionally, skills-based hiring and promotion augments workplace productivity significantly.

An engaging workplace is a product of empowered employees and a strong management. Effective people management involves multiple factors. For instance, analytical tools can help assess skill sets and determine the best fit for a position. The lure of higher pay or prestige can sometimes result in rushed and undesirable acceptances. Hence, ensure you take the time to thoroughly discuss job duties with prospective candidates for the role.

To foster a positive work environment, provide new and experienced department heads with support through training and development courses. Managers need a thorough knowledge of employment laws. In addition, conflict management, decision-making, motivation and organization are all necessary skills for a successful leader.

If you have the staff, appoint a mentor manager to help employees navigate their new tasks. Also, make sure the chain of command is clearly delineated. For instance, new supervisors are often selected from existing team members, making the shift from colleague to manager a difficult one. Only by providing comprehensive support can you help develop a positive employer experience — for the manager and their team.

provide flexibility

The 2024 Randstad Employer Brand Research reveals that work-life balance stands as the second most important motivator for employees to choose a new employer or stay with their current one. This data suggests that work-life balance has seen an increase in relative importance over the past 4 years and is now valued as highly as ‘competitive compensation and benefits’.

Conduct workplace surveys and gather data to determine what your employees want regarding workplace flexibility. A hybrid working model can significantly improve employee experience. Hybrid models empower your staff to decide their work schedules based on their productive hours, deliverables, and time-sensitive deadlines.

listen and learn

Internal employee surveys serve as the collective voice of your workforce. Implementing changes without employee input could result in discouraging outcomes. Treat your employees as essential contributors when building a positive work environment. Through surveys and brainstorming sessions, watch for common themes, even among varied suggestions. For example, if 20 people have differing opinions on the coffee bar but all bring it up, it's clear the current setup needs attention.

Furthermore, recognize that your employees’ are more familiar with your internal systems than you are, and hence, can offer creative solutions to workplace productivity enhancement. Consider suggestions from all levels of your team, including entry-level employees.

One way to get the focus onto the employees and away from leadership is to let the employees run the meeting. Your job is to listen, take notes and respond positively. While some ideas may involve more time or money than your company can spend, there are ways to tactfully address this without immediately shooting down a suggestion.

Keep in mind that employee experience lies at the core of your workplace strategy. It encompasses every touch point between employees and your organization, whether positive or negative.

To help you offer stellar employee experiences, we’ve developed an employee journey mapping template. This resource maps out your employee journey, identifying critical touch points from recruitment to separation. Use it to uncover areas for enhancement and elevate your workplace environment.