As each of us are unique, the meaning of happiness is different for everyone. This extends to workplaces – a topic which feels particularly timely as we near International Day of Happiness, on March 20th.
Personalising the employee experience has become a must-have. With the focus on work/life-balance, which Deloitte’s 2023 Gen Z & Millennial Survey claims is something that these generations strive for, but also on factors like meaningful career advancement and sustainability, this is no longer a nice-to-have, but essentially a necessity.
The report State of the Global Workplace, 2024 by Gallup, , shows that only 23% of employees worldwide are actively engaged.
Changing employee expectations
A competitive salary, bonus structures and pay increases are important. However, employees today want to be able to participate in decision-making and actively shape their organisation’s future.
It’s vital that we go beyond generalised standards and implement individual initiatives.
But how do we discover this important employee detail?
Consider the Employee Owned Trust model. This structure puts your employees at the heart of the company, ensures that they are valued and heard, and gives them the confidence to know they can contribute to something greater than themselves.
Personalising employee experience in practice
It’s important to remember that implementing an EOT is not a one-time thing. Employee ownership is a way to truly live and breathe employee empowerment and embrace a personalized approach. This means embedding the concept throughout your operation and implementing ongoing initiatives in response employees’ thoughts and suggestions.
There are several ways to achieve this.
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It is not only about advocating the flexible model but also dynamic working. This means that each person’s work hours and place of work can be adjusted based on his or her lifestyle, preferred working style, and current project. For example, if he or she has to service clients in a different time zone.
- Tailoring experiences as part of broader benefit schemes that reflect people’s roles and passions. It could be that you give your team members days off to coincide with dates that are important to them or that they take part in courses that don’t necessarily fall under the industry but still relate to their career goals.
- By empowering your team to create their own development path, you can avoid a one-size-fits all approach. Regular check-ins allow you to customize the tools, resources, and support so that employees can reach their goals, as well as evolve their career paths in the organization based on their interests.
- Employee ownership means that everyone in the company has a stake and can participate in the development of the business. Consider tailoring your approach by developing strategies that align with the interests of each employee. This could include pursuing a particular sector, initiating conversations with dream clients or pitching an important project.
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Highlighting impact
An employee-owned business is a B Corp model. This means that there are opportunities for all employees to be aligned and to contribute to your organisation’s values and vision. They are also actively involved in the sustainability journey.
It may be that you curate tools and resources your team has identified as being useful for their supplier relationships, enabling them to communicate confidently with clients about embedding sustainable practices in their own operations and project, and reflecting their passions.
Think about your company’s charitable framework, for instance, in a social context. Although supporting charities as a group is important, giving employees the option to choose the charities they want to volunteer for individually and providing time off can have a number of benefits.
No more labels, just flexibility
It’s not the best way to move forward. Instead, it is better to curate employee experiences by a collective or by factors like seniority, department, and generation.
We need to adopt a flexible strategy, where we adapt our approach according to the needs of individuals as they progress through their career and life stages.
What are the employers who do this? The employers that do so can expect high productivity and morale as the team members will be doing work they enjoy in an environment which nurtures and develops them.
There are also financial benefits. We spend so many hours at work. Research by McKinsey Health Institute and the World Economic Forum shows that improved employee health and well-being could generate $11.7 trillion of global economic value. Why not look for ways to bring happiness into the culture of your company at every opportunity?
