Where Employee Experience and Customer Experience Align, and Where They Diverge

Aligning EX and CX efforts pays off. But the two shouldn't be treated the same.

Having led both customer experience and employee experience programs, I understand more than many how important it is to align these initiatives. It is well-proven that EX and CX intersect and interact, and when well-harmonized, significant business results can be achieved. There are, however, some critical areas to watch for when launching a unified program, specifically ways in which your CX programs should differentiate from your EX program.
Overemphasis on Metrics and KPIs

In CX programs, metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs) such as Net Promoter Score (NPS), Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) and Customer Effort Score (CES) are critical, especially when looking at thousands, if not millions of customers. While segmentation and persona creation are also important, the sheer volume of data requires a more metrics-based design to help organize the information. These core KPIs help businesses quantify customer satisfaction and identify areas for improvement. 

However, an overreliance on metrics can be counterproductive in EX programs.

Employees are not customers — you probably don’t have millions of employees. Their needs require a more nuanced understanding, which rarely can be captured through quantitative metrics alone. Overemphasis on metrics can reduce employees to numbers, overlooking their individual contributions, needs and potential. According to a report by the Harvard Business Review, metrics-driven approaches often miss qualitative aspects of employee experience, such as team dynamics, leadership effectiveness and workplace culture. 

One of the most important components of EX is understanding sentiment and behaviors, and digging in to help employees feel better and more connected — insights that cannot be derived from data alone. Without the emotional understanding of your employees, they could feel undervalued and disconnected from their work, ultimately diminishing engagement and productivity.

An Alternative

As you build your EX listening and data management program, think of the metrics output in two components. The first is the pure KPI data — eNPS, Intent to Stay, Engagement, Retention, Attrition etc. Align these to your CX metrics, so you can measure where customer challenges occur and where they map back to employee opportunities. 

The second however is to build an employee sentiment storyboard. This is the opportunity to align the sentiment, open ends, feedback, user group, focus group content together with the scaled data to find the stories, themes and “why” behind the data. Look at what is happening, why it is happening and to whom. This allows you to maintain a more human understanding while still demonstrating scientific, data-led results and insights.

Treating Employees as Homogeneous Groups

CX strategies often segment customers into broad categories to tailor marketing, distribution efforts and customer service approaches. However, applying this segmentation strategy to employees can lead to oversimplified and ineffective EX programs.

Employees, unlike customers, spend a significant portion of their lives within the organization, interacting and growing daily with colleagues, managers and organizational structures. Treating employees as homogeneous groups can overlook the diverse needs, aspirations and challenges of individual employees or smaller subgroups within the workforce. This can result in generic programs that fail to address specific issues, reducing the overall effectiveness of EX initiatives.

Gartner highlights that employee experience should be personalized and flexible to accommodate the varying needs and circumstances of different employee demographics. This personalization is key to creating an inclusive and supportive workplace. Employee segmentation can help with test and learn pilots that target teams that might be struggling. However, organizations should understand the intrinsic and extrinsic motivations of their employees overall. Determining solutions based on behaviors can have a bigger impact than segmentation. After all, employees have different needs and priorities across the lifecycle with highly personalized reactions depending on impossible to measure variables.

An Alternative

Rather than leaning into a fixed segmentation model, consider something more flexible. Think about the major initiatives you are looking to launch, then look at the data and feedback around each program. It is essential to understand segments depending on the initiative because how employees react to a new benefits program could be different than a communication strategy or business plan. Creating segments based on initiative, rather than creating hard-coded segments can keep a sense of humanity and personalization across the organization.

Lack of Employee Involvement in Program Design

CX programs often rely on customer feedback to design services and products. Creating user testing and user experience design sessions are required for any product owner. However, when it comes to designing EX programs, merely collecting feedback without meaningful employee involvement can be ineffective. In fact, it is quite common to create programs based on business need, or leader assumptions rather than what could work best for employees. 

Employees have a keen understanding of their work environments and challenges. Excluding them from the design and implementation of EX programs can lead to solutions that are out of touch with their needs and can introduce some blockers that make them less productive, leading to customer impact. Participation in development of programs and tools can increase engagement, per Gallup. Engaging employees as active participants ensures that programs are relevant and effective.

An Alternative

If you have a survey or employee experience program, you already have insight on programs, policies or systems that might be creating inefficiencies or simply are difficult to use. By understanding where the challenges are, focus groups and internal design testing forums can help the organization ensure they are treating the foundational concerns, and more importantly, ensure they are not introducing more challenges with the new tools/ systems. Employees who use the systems most often should be part of the design team, to make sure that the new programs meet their needs.