You’ve probably heard about customer journeys and understand that this concept means making every touchpoint customers have with your business positive. You’ve figured out that good customer journeys are like money in the bank. But now, we hear about employee journeys too. What’s all that about, and does it even matter much?
Should you invest resources in employee journey mapping and making the whole map, including the departure of an employee, a great experience? In short, what’s in it for you? Turns out there’s a whole lot going on here, and like customer journeys, employee journeys could mean that you’re pocketing profits or suffering losses. Let’s unpack this!
Attracting the Best Means Being Attractive
It’s still an employees’ job market out there. Even when the average Joe is struggling to find employment, top candidates don’t lack opportunities. You want skilled people to be excited about working for you. And, let’s face it, the whole process of attracting applicants’ costs money, even if you stick to online methods.
The fact that you want to attract good applicants goes without saying. Are you succeeding in this, or are you driving them away? This step of the employee experience is more important than it may seem on the surface.
Retaining Talent Means Offering Great Working Conditions
Retaining talent isn’t all about money and benefits. It’s also about the experience of being an employee. If people love their jobs and find the work environment fulfilling, they’re likely to stay on even when they can take advantage of more lucrative options elsewhere. If they aren’t particularly enjoying their experience with your company, they might move on to something else, and that decision might not even be financially motivated.
If they do move on, you’re back at step one of the employee journey: attracting talent, and that takes time. Time is money. And then, there are the costs involved in onboarding, training, and orientation. Replacing a good employee, or even a promising one, costs you money. Retaining employees saves you money. Money saved is money earned.
Engaging Employees is Profitable
When people find their jobs fulfilling and believe in the companies for which they work, they demonstrate engagement through higher productivity. The rest of the equation is easy to figure out.
Higher productivity means better results in return for the same investment as “acceptable” results. Better results equate to lower costs in order to achieve similar outcomes. There are no balance sheets to prove this, but accountancy can only do so much. Logic, on the other hand, still applies, even when you don’t have all the figures to prove cause and effect.
Engaged employees are willing to do more, and they want to do more. Disengaged and neutral employees do the accepted minimum and head off home with the same paycheck. Which would you prefer?
Outgoing Employees are Advocates and Sources of Info
Sometimes, people move on. Knowing why they did so could point towards things that you need to change – or it could just be a matter of altered life circumstances. Since outgoing employees might not like to criticize your organization for fear of leaving bridges burned, your HRs will need to be sensitive and possibly use a little inference to figure out why your valued employee is leaving.
Apart from that, making the exit of a team member a positive experience might open them to recommending your company to contacts who share their talent and potential or who need what your company has to offer. You can’t lose, and you stand to win in the end!
