Reimagining employee experience through simplification

As a people leader, I know firsthand how difficult it is to navigate employee experience. Today’s world of work represents a digital sprawl that can often hinder employees’ work or make them feel like their efforts are futile. This lack of efficiency inevitably leads to a lack of engagement.

At the same time, we live in an age of experience where huge importance is placed on every interaction. The current talent crisis only underlines this further: Organisations must drive better experiences if they are to retain and attract employees.

The state of play means businesses are under more pressure than ever to establish a balance between engagement, the working environment, and technology. There’s a lot to think about, but I can tell you that reimagining employee experience to align these three elements is achievableーwith the right approach.

The struggles of the modern working world

First, we need to identify the specific pain points around this disharmony. From my interactions with customers across the North region, it’s clear that the current period of economic uncertainty is taking its toll on mental capacity. There’s a sense of cognitive overload that’s only made worse if the right foundations aren't present in the workplace.

Many businesses are stumbling blind through the new world of work, with efficiency and engagement suffering. Whether it’s disparate working environments, data silos, or disjointed processes, these scenarios can result in miscommunication and laborious tasksーonly increasing disengagement.

There’s also an absence of tools, systems, and guidelines to support employees properly in the remote world. Those that are in place often create a tricky landscape that’s confusing to navigate. More specifically, complex, multi-department workflows, inefficient processes, and lack of visibility across the enterprise create an all-round frustrating experience.

The difficulty this presents from a manager’s perspective is equally concerning. Many are struggling to adapt in order to provide the necessary support for employees. Personalised career journeys, valuable conversations, and clear guidance are only possible if managers have the tools to better focus on their teams.

Simplifying and connecting experience

Addressing all these challenges comes down to harnessing technology that brings together the dynamics of the workplace in a way that’s simple and seamless. People leaders like myself need human resources tools that equip us to properly support employees.

ServiceNow Manager Hub is purpose-built to help teams engage better and unlock efficiency. It provides a unified layer on top of all systems that employees interact with daily, whether they’re working from home or in the office. Time is no longer wasted searching for information because everything is one place.

People leaders can actively listen to their employees and meet their needs instead of constantly firefighting. Manager Hub acts as a one-stop shop to find data from across the enterprise that tells managers what’s going on with their teams and what they need to know or do as leaders.

For instance, if employees prefer to use a specific front end, such as Microsoft Teams or Slack, it can be established as the digital front door for all requests and processes. This principle of simplicity removes frustrating processes and cognitive overload to enable greater efficiency.

Identifying opportunities for simplicity is something I’ve witnessed our customers doing already—with impressive results. For instance, in our region, the City of Copenhagen uses ServiceNow to identify manual tasks that are ripe for automation. It recognised that the interface for this technology needed to be user-friendly to truly harness efficiency.

For this reason, the city created a platform that catered to all employees—from managers to blue-collar workers—to help ensure everyone embraced the system. Through this approach, Copenhagen saved €1 million via increased productivity and efficiency in case resolution.

Driving valuable interactions

It’s not just about optimising processes. Meaningful interactions are equally important in engaging experiences. Establishing an all-purpose digital portal such as Manager Hub makes this possible. Employees have all the knowledge they need to feel a part of the company culture with values, guidelines, and principles that are readily accessible.

This is instrumental for managers covering all responsibilities from hiring and onboarding to training and development. It provides clarity on where employees are in each of these procedures and guides relevant conversations that people leaders need to act on in order to create more efficient processes.

Our work in the North region underlines what you can achieve through a digital one-stop shop for employee engagement. For instance, Sweden-based defence and security business Saab used to suffer from a slow and bureaucratic onboarding process. By introducing a singular hub for finding information, it saved an estimated 12,000 hours in one year and realised a 25% rise in employee satisfaction.

Valuable interactions enable businesses to align their people with the direction of the enterprise. Employees truly feel a part of their environment. Such positive experiences motivate everyone to play their part in realising the company’s vision.

The future of employee experience

It’s clear that businesses need to make significant changes if they are to enhance employee experience in the modern workplace. While there are challenges, people can feel engaged and harness efficiency if the right technology is in place.

It’s a case of simplifying every interaction and establishing that singular digital access point for all needs. Doing so is the key to reimagining employee experience and nurturing your most valuable asset: people.

Find out more about how ServiceNow solutions can enhance your employee experience.

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