The Employee Experience Isn't HR's Job. It's Yours.

The Employee Experience Isn't HR's Job. It's Yours.

Before we get started - this may be one you want to forward to that manager who thinks that they are not causing the bad employee experience. Because, yes, they are - and everyone knows it, and they may not even care.

Let me ask you this.  Have you had a bad restaurant experience? Cold food. A server who treated your order as a personal inconvenience. You didn't write a review. You didn't complain to a manager. You just... never went back.  Yes, we all have - and maybe we went back, and the second time was all the same.  Or maybe there is the one thing that you do come back for that made up for the bad service.

Just last week, I went to a restaurant and had made a reservation.  Got to the front counter and I said, "we have a reservation for 11:30," and she said, "well, I know that you do not because we do not take reservations."  We did go back because the bacon was the bomb.

Here's the uncomfortable part: your employees are doing the exact same math about working for you - or that other bad manager. Maybe you are buffering that bad manager so they keep coming back. How long can you manage to cover for the bad manager?

Employees don't file a grievance every time they have a bad week. They don't send HR a strongly worded email every time their manager cancels a one-on-one for the third time in a row. They just quietly recalibrate how much of themselves they're willing to bring to work. And eventually, they stop coming back, whether that means walking out the door or staying and checking out completely.

Gallup has been tracking this for years, and the data keeps saying the same thing in a slightly louder voice each time: managers account for the vast majority of the variance in team engagement. Not the mission statement. Not the snack bar. Not the annual engagement survey that gets read once and filed. The manager.

So here's the reframe I want to leave you with: employee experience is not an HR program. It is not a task that lives on someone's project list between benefits open enrollment and the holiday party. Every single leader in your organization is already creating an employee experience, on purpose or by accident, whether they've ever thought about it that way or not.

A good experience.  A bad experience.  Every day an employee has an experience when they come to work.  They want a good one.  The bad ones - that is why they just quit returning.  They quit being productive.  They just sit and wait for another check.  Or another job.

The question was never whether you're creating it. The question is whether you're doing it on purpose.

That's the whole premise behind Driving the Employee Experience, and it's the lens every post this month is going to run through. If you lead people, you are the experience. Act like it.

What's the last "bad service" experience you personally never went back for? I'd bet it taught you more about leadership than most trainings you've sat through.

Reanette Etzler, PHR, CLRM. Keynote Speaker, Facilitator and The Strategic HR Coach. Driving the Employee Experience. www.thestrategichrcoach.com, [email protected]

Join the Strategic HR Circle - Free: https://thestrategichrcircle.app.clientclub.net/communities/groups/the-strategic-hr-coach-free/home?invite=6a694a5f9a19b46aa89dc139

Take the HR Hangover Survey Today: https://hlapi.espeakers.com/qr/abtp_cYTAaNT

Schedule a call: https://hlapi.espeakers.com/widget/bookings/reanette-etzler-personal-calendar-u04dkbei1