When you think about customer experience, what comes to mind?

For most people, the answer is likely that it’s an organization’s responsibility to provide customers with a great experience. This isn’t wrong, but there’s more to it. Your best-laid plans for customer experience go nowhere without invested and dedicated employees. To build a strong culture of employee engagement at your company, you need to give them a voice in how things are run on both day-to-day operations and your goals and objectives.

For two decades, Gallup has studied the links between employee experience and healthy business outcomes. The results are clear: employee engagement leads to better employee retention and productivity — and customers that stay longer and spend more. Recent research by the Temkin Group finds a 30% boost to employee commitment in customer-centric companies.

If you’re beginning your company’s journey to be more customer-focused, it’s time to get comfortable with a paradigm shift: employee experience. Just as customers desire products and services that minimize frustrations and help them thrive, employees also want these things in their workspace. They seek emotional engagement in what they do every day and want to feel like their feedback matters. An engaged employee will go the extra mile because they understand how their actions make a positive difference for customers and colleagues.

How do you give your employees a voice? Here are some tips you can use in your organization. Read more

From the article “Want to Deliver a Great Customer Experience? Give Your Employees a Voice” by Brad Cleveland, published in Young Upstarts.