Nali Giliana, Vice President of Global Growth Strategy at UserTesting
Digital transformation is part of every business strategy, with 71% of organisations reporting to either be in the process of or recently completed a digital transformation. However, there’s a danger the term has become overused, thrown around by businesses for years now to demonstrate they’re forward-thinking and on the pulse of our increasingly digital world. While most digital transformation efforts are focused on the customer, brands are often forgetting employee experiences as part of their strategy and as a result, employees are finding themselves left behind.
The best-planned digital transformations are about consolidating all aspects of a company’s approach through a carefully considered move towards the digital. Managed effectively, digital transformation offers opportunities for employees to feel engaged with and invested in, optimising internal communications and processes.
Employee engagement as part of a digitalisation strategy
Throughout history, business owners have always prioritised the implementation of new technologies that promise to improve performance and return on investment. Even in the past ten years, changes to digital technology have brought on new opportunities to revolutionise how we work. But what some employers don’t consider is that just because a system is new it isn’t necessarily the best fit for your employees.
A study by VMWare found that 95% of IT professionals feel they provide employees with all the digital tools they need to do their job successfully, but only 58% of employees and HR felt the same way. This fundamental difference in the way IT teams and other departments regard their digital employee experience shows a concerning number of employees who are dissatisfied and at risk of being left behind.
Being left to work on a new digital system that is frustrating to use and doesn’t solve issues with previous processes results in many employees feeling disgruntled and devalued. And as we look at a future where the world of work for many has made the permanent shift towards hybrid and remote working, staying attuned to the feelings of your employees virtually is now more important than ever before in ensuring a positive employee experience.
The best method to ensure the success of your digitalisation and an engaged workforce? Factor employee engagement and feedback into your plans from the outset and ensure everyone in the company is on board and involved throughout the process.
Holistic human insights drive employee engagement
Delivering the best possible digital experience for your employees requires investment and a holistic approach that is mindful of the relative strengths of both quantitative and qualitative research methods. While quantitative feedback can help business leaders assess the overall mood of the entire workforce, qualitative research can unlock human insights that help businesses identify and overcome individual pain points in an employee’s workflow or tech stack.
Video interviews conducted remotely ensure employees feel at-ease in their own homes, facilitating more candid feedback than the public office setting. Business leaders can assess how your employees are interacting with the digital tools provided for their work, mapping their movements through programs to identify and troubleshoot pain points. Adding further depth, video interviews allow employees to speak through their thoughts as they navigate digital tools and, additionally, allows leaders to perceive their non-verbal cues to enhance the understanding of their feelings.
By taking the time to undertake this level of research, firms can put their employees at the centre of everything they do when deploying digital strategy, meeting the needs of teams at every point and avoiding unnecessary friction. Businesses benefit from the improved engagement and retention that comes from not only ensuring smooth digital processes but also from ensuring employees feel like they’re heard and valued.
The results of investing in digitalised employee assessment measures
Through strong engagement with employees, organisations can ensure their digitalisation strategy is implemented in the most effective way possible, entering a new era for the business without leaving employees behind. And as employees who are very satisfied with their tech are 3-4x more engaged than those who are not, ensuring employees needs are met across a digitalisation strategy by incorporating their feedback is key to a companies’ future growth.
Digital transformation will continue to revolutionise how we do business, but leaders must ensure they keep the human perspective front and centre to ensure employees are engaged and business continues to thrive.
www.UserTesting.com
PlatoAi. Web3 Reimagined. Data Intelligence Amplified.
Click here to access.
Source: http://hrnews.co.uk/dont-let-digitalisation-leave-employees-behind/
