How to use people tech to improve the digital employee experience

Think about how your day goes when there’s no internet. 

Your email or Slack goes down, the project management system won’t load, or the HCM that everyone uses to clock in and out has a timeout. 

The entire business feels the effects if anything breaks—or even if it just slows down a little. 

But behind the scenes, HR Ops comes to the rescue. 

As the backbone of organizations’ tech-reliant functionality, HR Ops’s collaboration with the IT and cybersecurity teams ensures uninterrupted service from the tech everyone relies on in today’s globally dispersed businesses. 

Employee experience depends on people tech for smooth communication and workflows between colleagues, partners, and customers. It also depends on people’s ability to access and execute tasks to keep things business as usual. 

This blog will take a deep dive into the hand HR Ops and HRIS directors have in enhancing and measuring the digital employee experience—and, by association, business performance. 

We’ll talk about practical approaches you can take to integrating technology into the workday and driving a successful digital transformation.

Best practices for HR’s coordination with IT and CIS teams

First and foremost, it’s crucial for HR and our IT and CIS counterparts to keep sight of the fact that we all have the same goal: 

Providing the most optimal employee experience possible through best-in-class tech tools to achieve business goals. 

Fully embracing this shared vision means that we need to maintain a global perspective and recognize the intricacies and nuances of the modern multi-national working world: the realities of remote, asynchronous, and globally dispersed teams. 

This means that any conversation about bringing in new tools and technologies has to start with asking people-focused questions that aim to improve the digital employee experience. Questions such as:

• Why do your people need it?
• How will your people use it?
• What solutions can provide your people with the best user experience across your business?

Making these inquiries will help make sure that any tech adoption isn’t just about the tools themselves, but about fostering a more connected, efficient, and satisfying work environment for your whole team. 

Optimize organizational resources

The key to optimizing your organizational resources lies in strategically building a tech stack and infrastructure that resonates with your people’s needs and your company goals. 

But this process goes beyond just amassing a collection of the latest technologies. It’s about conducting a thorough, thoughtful analysis of how each tool can balance between boosting your digital employee experience and meeting your business objectives. 

Once your tech is in place, you can further optimize your resources by engaging in a dialogue with your team about the effectiveness of your tech stack. This way, you can gain valuable insights into the day-to-day operational needs and pain points of your people. 

This feedback loop is crucial for pinpointing what tools truly add value, streamline processes, and foster a culture of efficiency and innovation. 

Ensure continuous service across global sites

Thanks to hybrid, remote, and multi-site or multi-national work, teams today are globally dispersed. 

But while your people may be spread out across the world, they still need to be able to speak to each other in real time, work asynchronously on projects, and access your company platforms without disruption. 

So what happens if disaster strikes and your communication channels crash? 

Communication is vital for all teams, especially when they’re spread around the world. That’s why it’s important to have a plan in place to ensure continuous services across global sites. 

For example, should a primary communication tool like Slack crash or become unavailable, having an alternative such as WhatsApp or Signal ready to go means that your teams can remain connected without missing a beat. 

Similarly, putting a comprehensive cloud services recovery strategy in place means that you can swiftly restore data and services—minimizing downtime and preserving continuity throughout your organization.

Identify the right analytics and reporting tools

When it comes to choosing analytics and reporting tools that work for you, it’s important to take a pragmatic, streamlined approach:

• Define your specific needs. Identify what you need your tools to do. Do you need them for customer scheduling? Project management? Employee performance tracking? All of them combined? Having clarity on what you need helps guide your search for the right tech. 
• Initiate a request for information (RFI). Use an RFI to gather detailed information from tech vendors. This helps you assess which solution lines up with your requirements and stays within your budget. 
• Evaluate your user experience (UX). Picking tools that offer an intuitive user experience is key. For example, a customer meeting platform should be easy to use and facilitate collaboration. 
• Consider third-party automation. Look into automation technologies that can integrate with your systems. This way, you can boost your efficiency without compromising on security. 
• Address security and usage visibility. Ensure that the tools you’re selecting allow for secure login and provide clear visibility into your user activity. This helps you manage access and protect sensitive information. 
• Collaborate across departments. Have HR Ops, IT, and CIS work together to evaluate solutions, focusing on the employee (and customer) user experience and overall security. 

Provide centralized access to apps

Having centralized access to apps with the right permissions and security protocols is a delicate balance. Your people need to have access to their platforms to carry out their jobs efficiently, but it’s also vital to maintain the integrity and security of company data. 

The key to this approach is utilizing blockers and self-service programs. 

These tools allow your people to access the necessary apps autonomously, all while ensuring that the access is within the bounds of their role and your security protocols. 

For example, while your HCM system might be accessible to everyone within your organization, the specifics of what each person can see or do should vary.

HR professionals play a crucial role in this balance. It’s HR’s responsibility to communicate to IT and CIS who in the organization requires certain access according to their roles and responsibilities. 

This clear delineation makes sure that access rights are correctly assigned and managed, keeping your organization’s operations smooth and secure.

Shaping the future workplace with HR technology

The strategic integration of HR technology in the modern workplace plays a key role in the digital employee experience. 

Whether it’s ensuring continuous service across global sites to optimizing organizational resources, the collaboration between HR, IT, and CIS is fundamental. 

As HR professionals, we can foster a more connected, efficient, and satisfying work environment for our people when we prioritize a people-first approach, ask the right questions, and choose the right tools.