Employee Engagement - Engaging your workforce
Reframing the employee experience
The challenge of creating a compelling employee experience isn’t new, but it’s certainly complex. A multifaceted subject with many intertwining entry points, it connects data, tools and a deep understanding of employees, culture, and both physical and nonphysical work environments.
Recent events have complicated matters. Employees are reconsidering their priorities and expectations, and people are increasingly looking to make work fit with life, rather than the other way around. This is welcoming in the next leap in the employee value proposition, characterized by a move from the “thrive contract” — employees and employers focused on well-being needs, including purpose, equity and impact — to the “lifestyle contract,” in which employers and employees are focused on getting a fair deal. People want to feel fulfilled through choice, connection and contribution.
The emerging lifestyle contract calls on companies to adapt their employee experience strategies — the intersection of their employees’ expectations, environments (culture, coworkers, leaders, processes, technology, workspaces) and events (both work and life). Are companies succeeding? According to our 2022 Global Talent Trends study, despite 88% of employees feeling satisfied in their current roles, two in five still plan to leave this year, with Gen Z being both the most satisfied (92%) and the most likely to depart (55%). Additionally, one in three HR leaders is seeing higher-than-normal turnover in talent with valued digital skills.
Flexible and hybrid working has ushered in new challenges, and organizations are trying to get ahead by solving these questions:
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How can we understand how the needs and circumstances of different populations have changed?
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How can we segment and empathize with our people in more nuanced ways?
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How can we co-create a targeted and focused solution that meets the needs of our most critical employee segments and challenges?
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How can we design employee experience programs and processes that are agile and can adapt to changing employee needs?
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HR is being pulled in many directions — where are our gaps, what challenge areas should we prioritize so we can have the biggest impact and how do these fit in with our existing initiatives?
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How can we use technology and data analytics to implement, optimize or create systems from which to draw insights continuously regarding the employee experience?
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How can we best implement the proposed changes and develop a communication strategy in a hybrid world?
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How can we ensure managers are equipped to make a difference in the employee experience in an increasingly diverse workforce?
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How can we measure success and contextualize the results for planning in the broader HR sphere?
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How can we design an employee experience strategy that’s linked to workforce strategy?
A deep understanding of the employee will not be enough. This year, the percentage of energized employees is at an all-time low. Creating an employee experience that energizes people will be critical, and as many organizations undergo transformation, marrying the transformation agenda with improving the employee experience can hold the keys to sustainable growth. For example, by designing meaningful work to engage and retain people and creating “space” to focus on the employee experience.
Take this moment of profound change to make strides in improving the employee experience using design thinking and bringing your employees in focus.
Create a positive organizational culture that motivates employees
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Drive and measureperformance by establishing clear goals from the outset and clearing the path for employees to succeed.
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Adapt strategiesthat maximize your employees’ strengths using flexible and participative systems, processes, tools, and resources.
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Sustain enthusiasmby building camaraderie between employees, leaders, and managers — because teams go further, together.
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Promote collaborationby empowering leaders and managers to live by example and embody the organization’s positive values
Read more about employee engagement and organizational culture
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Keep your finger on the pulse | COVID-19
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Engage employees amidst digital transformation
Don’t advance your software while leaving human employees behind. Do digital transformation the effective way by exercising employee engagement strategies with a human touch.
Mercer in the media: Culture & Employee Engagement
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Tech & culture for staff engagement
Why are Singapore’s employee engagement levels lagging behind the rest of APAC? Mercer tells all in this release. -
The expert opinion on employee engagement
Do Singapore employees enjoy working with their companies, and what can be done to change that? Hear what the experts have to say. -
Ways to invest in and engage employees
“Employees are key assets to any organization”. Mercer elaborates on what this notion looks like in practice at the 2019 HCP-SPH forum. -
Why business transformations must include worker engagement
The low down on what was discussed at the 2019 HCP-SPH forum attended by 100 business leaders and HR practitioners.