Digital employee experience (DEX) runs parallel to workplace technology in supporting your people to efficiently use platforms and devices that help them do their jobs. The digital employee experience spans all of the digital touchpoints that your people interact with in their working day, and how they feel about each touchpoint.
Ivanti reported that 17% of IT professionals, executives, and end users have either quit their job due to poor tech or would consider it. This figure is almost doubled for digital natives, Gen Z.
With more Gen Z entering the workforce, digital competence from organisations is more important than ever. It’s less of a nice to have, and more of a necessity if you want to attract and retain the best talent who can continue to perform at the top of their game.
In this article, we will look at how modern workplace technology can impact DEX and offer guidance on how to improve digital employee experience within your organisation.
The components of digital employee experience (DEX)
Several elements contribute to the digital employee experience. While ownership of digital transformation and workplace technology may usually be attributed to IT, the digital employee experience is more encompassing than that.
Reliability and performance of devices and software
- Are all of your systems and devices secure?
- Can devices handle all software or do they crash, slow down or struggle with some?
- Can you ensure seamless connectivity to mobile devices with VPN
- Do these devices and workplace technology enable your people to work anywhere?
Employee experience
- Do your systems enable colleagues to collaborate and connect?
- Can your workplace technology simplify and enhance the user experience?
- Can you streamline processes to boost productivity and business success?
- How can you efficiently collect feedback and troubleshoot user issues?
When laid out like this, it’s clear that IT and internal comms teams have equal responsibility over the DEX strategy. The most appropriate approach to DEX is probably to pull together a project team that can bring insights from their respective business areas to inform this strategy.
Workplace technology and productivity
Digital employee experience is more than a tech problem, which might sound absurd considering the word ‘digital’. When DEX strategy is applied correctly, organisations can iron out digital roadblocks to attract, and more importantly retain, top talent. Here’s how organisations can reap the benefits of investing in digital transformation.
Smooth operating systems
By investing in digital transformation and the tools to simplify the user experience, your people can focus on their output rather than tech issues. Reducing the risk of ‘rage quitting’ from poor operating systems and introducing intuitive systems can significantly improve job satisfaction and productivity.
Give the people what they need
With many roles inside an organisation, different platforms or tools will be required for various departments and teams. Tailoring access to tools on a departmental basis means that systems are less clogged and only those who need access to certain platforms can have it. Plus, there may be some cost savings from unneeded licences that you can get rid of. Staying on top of the latest versions of important software should ensure that even those on the heftier platforms can still get the best digital employee experience. Auditing each person’s tech requirements against their current setup may help.
Stay connected
We cannot forget about the role of tech in forging connections between colleagues.
Outdated, clunky internal comms tools favoured one-way, top-down communication. Modern intranet tools encourage connection, socialisation and community among all levels and corners of the business. Understanding what other teams are up to, sharing news from your own departmental or branch successes and having spaces to be social and connect over shared interests can play a large role in employee satisfaction.
Level up your DEX strategy by integrating your third-party tools into a modern intranet platform. This can streamline the digital employee experience and provide one central hub for your people to use as their ‘go-to’ for company news, social or community updates and access to workplace technology they use each day.
Why an intranet is pivotal to your DEX strategy
Onboarding
Setting your people up for success from the moment they accept the job offer, through to their first day and beyond, will set them off to a strong start. Using workplace technology such as an intranet can be super helpful when introducing new employees to the company.
Creating specialist onboarding homepages that contain only the relevant information they need for their first few days. This will keep them focused on training without overwhelming them, whilst introducing them to policies, procedures and their team.
Saving time
Creating one central place where your people can access resources and third-party software for their day-to-day duties ensures that their logins are secure and time is saved on opening up every program individually.
Or, if they’re looking for a process or policy, a quick search can bring it up in seconds, rather than having to trawl through folders to find an up-to-date version.
Making work as easy as possible will enable your people to focus more on their job, rather than worrying or battling with tech.
Social and community
We’re not robots. We need social connections to get by, and we should be able to meet like-minded people throughout the business. There are a myriad of job types, encompassing remote, deskless and office-based roles. Each person should have the same opportunities to connect with their wider colleagues and share in their company’s successes.
From affinity groups to sports clubs, away days and sharing award wins or customer feedback, a modern intranet facilitates communication that can make your people feel closer, no matter where they are. In our Employee Happiness survey, 31% of employees said that atmosphere and relationships contribute to happiness at work. Often, the better our connections, the easier it becomes to work together and feel satisfied with our employer.
Personalised feed
While we want opportunities to socialise and find what we need within seconds, there are limits to what is relevant to each person. Factory floor staff don’t necessarily need to know about a new sales tool, and remote colleagues don’t need to know about a new uniform policy. Perhaps your staff are on varied contracts and not one size fits all when it comes to holiday allowance updates.
Oak Engage’s smart feed will only show the updates most relevant to your people, avoiding information overload and keeping them engaged with content that matters. Tailoring the content that various teams or individuals will see based on job type or location will improve the digital employee experience by reducing the noise.
Level up your DEX strategy
The modern intranet has a multitude of benefits for increasing operational efficiency and improving digital employee experience (DEX). We have seen exceptional successes with customers in a wide range of industries, who have often seen cost savings from implementing Oak’s intranet.
If you’re looking for ways to boost your digital employee experience, reach out for a demo of our platform. Let’s see how we can help to bolster your engagement and retention stats through the use of modern workplace technology.