Why Pizza Parties Don't Fix Culture: Architecting the Modern Employee Experience
In this conversation, Clarence Bongalos and Natalie K. Jackson discuss the architecture of the employee journey, the impact of brand activation on the employee journey, the silos and fragmentation of the employee journey, the infrastructure of the employee journey, the candidate experience, and the transactional and dehumanized candidate experience.
They emphasize the importance of the employee journey as brand activation and highlight the significant impact of the candidate experience on brand equity.
This episode of The Aligned › Engaged › Fulfilled Podcast with Clarence Bongalos discuss the following:
Your external promises to the market must perfectly match your internal employee experience.
The modern employee experience begins the moment a candidate interacts with your brand.
Treating applicants transactionally turns potential talent into vocal brand detractors.
When HR, marketing, and management don't align, the employee is forced to navigate a fragmented journey.
It’s an iterative, cross-functional process, not a one-and-done whiteboard exercise.
Unbiased external facilitators bypass internal power dynamics to uncover what employees are really experiencing.
Superficial perks will never overcome the daily friction of broken operational systems.
Fumbling the exit process will instantly erase years of accumulated goodwill.
Relying on stale, annual engagement surveys creates a massive blind spot for leaders.
To succeed, the architect of your culture needs three things: access to leaders, cross-functional influence, and budget.
View the full transcript as Natalie and Clarence discuss architecting the modern employee experience:
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Hello, welcome back and uh thank you for being here. In our last episode, we sat down with John Forica, the quote unquote ex Disney guy, and we talked about the
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vision of a magical culture. But here's the reality check. You can have the best Disney vision in the world, but if your systems are broken, all the magic dies.
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So if your candidate experience is a black hole, if your onboarding is just paperwork, and if your offboarding is
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ice cold, you don't have a culture. what you have is a compliance checklist. So today we're moving from the vision to
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the architecture. We're going to look at the blueprints of the entire employee journey. Returning to the show is my good friend and the architect of
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Experience herself, Natalie Jackson. Now if you were with us in season 1, um I believe it was episode 7 with Moni Shukla, you know that Natalie is the
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founder of Crescent Consultancy and an expert in optimizing endtoend customer and employee journeys. Natalie and I
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recently sat down to catch up over coffee and she was updating me about the work that she's doing. Now, I was telling her about mine and the two were just evidently aligned. So, naturally, I invited her to come back on the show.
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She's launching a new newsletter called Now Keep Listening, which I love because it focuses on the hardest part of communications, what happens after you
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ask the question. She believes that brand activation starts with employees and that your brand isn't what you tell the market it is. It's what your employees experience every single day.
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So today, we're going to challenge the traditional definition of the employee journey. We're going to argue that it doesn't start on day one and end on the
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employees exit date. In the future of work, and really in today's world, we have to map the journey before and beyond the employees tenure.
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it. It right.
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Natalie, welcome to the show. I'm so excited to have you back.
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Thank you, Clarence. I'm so happy to be here.
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Well, let's get right into it. I want to start with a concept that you're unpacking right now. Brand activation.
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Companies spend millions of dollars activating their brand for customers.
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They do launch parties. They hire influencers. They do unboxing experiences, but internally brand
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activation usually means handing somebody a laptop and a hoodie on day one. So if I promise innovation to the
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market, but my employee onboarding is a PDF from 2005, then that trust is instantly broken. So why do organizations treat the employee journey
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as more of an HR checklist instead of a brand activation campaign? And what does that do to the culture to engagement
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when that first touch point feels bureaucratic instead of branded?
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Yeah, I love that question and I'm glad that we have more than like two minutes on the topic. Yeah, right.
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It's quite a hour won't even be enough. I know. I know. There's so much in here.
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Um, you know, with thinking about the customer experience and the employee experience, I hear myself saying all the time, right? It's brand activation
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across every single touch point and a great vehicle or way to have leaders who are running and managing organizations
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is to say well yeah let's let's put the customer at the center of everything but in that same conversation you know I always hear myself saying and saying
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well what about your employees they go hand in hand c and ex go hand in hand and there are so so many reasons whe
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whether it's silos fragmentation the person who owns the employee experience is over here and not having those same strategic and branding conversations.
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The I guess the the reason is there are many reasons the why many reasons. Yeah.
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Right. And I think that knowing that this is such a big gap. It's a very very fun topic uh to tackle and I as you said
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earlier you know companies are spending so much on the brand side. Well, what about the level of disengagement across,
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right? You know, just in kind of peeking at at some of the stats out there, 21% of employees worldwide they say are engaged. So, what about that 79% that
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aren't, right?
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And estimated in the US disengagement costs 350 billion annually. So, if you don't have your employees equipped,
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enabled, aware, bought in, believing, trusting, they're not going to feel great. They're not going to show up.
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They're not going to perform. and they're not going to feel like they belong. They're not going to feel safe. And it just keeps going from there.
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Yeah, 100%. And you and I with Monty, we explored this first back in season one together where we really dove into kind
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of this concept of CX and EX and the relationship between the two. And you you use the word silo, which I think is exactly what the problem is, is that
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we're looking at CX and EX as two completely different things, if people are even thinking about it at all. And I think that's the root of the problem is
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that traditionally for as long as we've known business and business operations, we've never thought about the customer experience and the employee experience
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as one when they should be more and more especially in today's like digital world, right?
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It's it's more true than ever. And I think until as a business leader until you recognize that relationship that they're truly they need to be looked at
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as almost one and the same. I want I'm going to say almost because there are obviously nuances that differentiate between the two, but in a in a more
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broad scale they're essentially the same, right? Where employee experience is the starting point of the entire thing.
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So you've said and you know I've had the pleasure, opportunity, honor of previewing some of the work that you're
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you're doing um before it gets to go out which is you know an exciting thing. You have said that every touch point either reinforces or erodess trust.
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Mhm.
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So if I'm a candidate and I get ghosted or if I'm a new hireer and my email doesn't work, that's not just an annoying thing. It really is a signal.
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How do those small broken operational moments accumulate to destroy the brand rel excuse me, brand belief of an
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employee before they're even at the finish line of their first month, right? I mean, I think with that, we can
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all look within ourselves, right? What have we experienced and what does it feel like for us if you feel like you're not being cared for or someone didn't
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even think about it or they didn't you can tell already that if it is entering an organization, there's no like system
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in place to get you set up or you're not given a cohort of others who are starting on the same day or you really do, hey, log into that SharePoint.
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there's a checklist out there and come back to me after you finish it and then if you need help here's the helpline instead of you know whatever it might
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feel like to have a little thought and there was a recent example of this I will not say who but a very well-known brand that has very a very very strong
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following um there was a candidate who made it to an interview had admired this company and this brand for a very very
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long time got the interview it was sort of a panel type interview via Zoom Zoom and I checked in with this person, said, "How'd it go?" Cuz they were so so
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excited. One of the person didn't show up. Another person was late. And then they proceeded, but it wasn't a complete
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interview. And then fast forward a few weeks, they got a note saying they didn't get the position.
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That person, the trust, the belief in the brand, what they stood with that, they just went to a competitor with
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their beliefs. They no longer value that brand. And I think that if that's not a signal and that's systematic, sure
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that's one person, but how many times is this happening for people all over the place? You see something the shiny lights out there about what this brand does and perhaps the values are aligned.
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But then if that employee who is responsible for coordinating those interviews or, you know, knowing what to accomplish and when to follow up and the
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timelines and the expectations and those systems are not put in place, well, it's never going to match. It's just not
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right. Well, there's so much that I want to kind of tug on in in what you just said and part of it is that you know
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natural or traditionally and I am no employee experience expert at all. So for those of you listening like Natalie is the expert here. I am just the person
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that asked the questions. But from what I have witnessed through my career experience, um, traditionally when we even if anybody is even thinking about
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it, if your company's one of the ones that are quote unquote good because they're thinking about employee experience, traditionally we're looking at employee
Chapter 2: Infrastructure and Employee Journey
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experience starting at the point of attracting employees or attracting candidates. But more and more, especially in today's
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kind of techdriven, social media driven world, it has to start way before that.
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And I'm going to dive into that in a little bit. But I want to ask you a little bit about the infrastructure because I think here lies part a big part of the problem right we talk about
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the silos in terms of the way that we look at it from a broader perspective but in terms of the infrastructure let's look at the current state of that
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employee journey because from what I can see it looks a little bit like Frankenstein right marketing might own the career page then
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recruiting owns the interview and you have HR who owns the onboarding then there's the manager who owns the day-to-day today and nobody's talking to each other.
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Right. Right.
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And so the experience feels very choppy, very like uncoordinated. Um, and to your point, like they put the employee in the
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room and then they almost expect them to just figure it out. And you know, we can argue that it's a capacity issue or
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whatever, but you see this fragmentation up close. How do these silos create misaligned expectations? And who should
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be the architect that connects these dots? so that the employee feels one seamless story.
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Yeah, I think it's it's a very good point. I mean all of it and part of it is when you say the infrastructure that's the right. Yeah. The architecture
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behind like how are we setting it up so that the entire journey can feel consistent and thoughtful and values aligned and brand aligned. Well, perhaps
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we even just define that, right? So, what does that mean and what might that journey look like? uh you know and when
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we think about the journey stages for an employee there is a slight parallel to the customer side but yeah it's like learning about the awareness just
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learning about the brand and maybe you learn from a you know a job posting or from a friend or from a referral
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whatever that entry point is then maybe you get an interview nowadays maybe
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right and so there's there's that process that leaves people feeling frustrated because it's difficult If you're looking for a full-time position
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now, so you're already starting out in a place if you're empathizing with that candidate, you're empath you're from a place of difficulty, frustration,
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thousands of lost, you know, in a black hole applications and all kinds of things. So accessibility in the beginning before even having a
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conversation to know what to expect, that's one of the biggest things when journey mapping is put yourself in in their shoes. how are they feeling and
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how can we meet them to help them make it easier and then moving through what you were kind of touching on is like okay so I got the interview and now I'm
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here and who am I meeting with and can you help me and give me me as candidate right can you give me the lay of the land and what to expect so many I it's
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like more than half of people nowadays drop out of the application like process the interview process because it takes too long now perhaps if we're setting
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expectations you know maybe they'll wait around a little bit longer but everybody's looking for something right now. And so we lose people even there
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before we even have an offer to consider, right?
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I don't know if I should pause, but it's like thinking about each of those stages and how thoughtful we can be and you know moving through to what you you kind
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of touched on, you know, they join, what does day one look like, what does onboarding look like, how do they grow their career there hopefully, you know, how do we help them succeed and keep
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them equipped and thriving? And that, you know, culture lives in all of it.
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But that's a big culture moment to then, well, if they're going to exit, that's okay. Nowadays, a lot of people, it's like eight jobs or something, right?
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Compared to Exactly. It's so much more accepted generationally, too. And so that's okay.
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We want to wish somebody well or if somebody is later in their career or, you know, retirement or whatever, then let's set them up for success so that they leave and they're an advocate of
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the company. That's super important, too. And then for any moment along there now because you can post and share and tell more people. You're not just
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telling the people in your inner ecosystem. You're posting it and you're sharing. So your brand's not so great in that moment.
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And I know that you asked the question well ownership. Well, I think that's part of it too is like if it lives only in HR and HR is doing their best to
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collaborate and stay brand aligned and work with the leaders and read the job descriptions and have a process that listens and gets the right candidates. I
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think that infrastructure-wise for both customer experience and employee experience we need to rise above the systems, the silos, the fragmentation
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and say okay how do we understand the journey so that we can all see see the same thing and then share the data
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around it as we're listening so we can not feel like only one person gets to see that but democratize the data and
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use that to do better. I could go on and on so I'm going to pause.
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I would love for you to go on and on because this is fascinating. Well, that's what comes to mind for me is like let's first just say what it is. We need
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a journey. We don't have that. Most organizations don't have that. It's amazing when there's intention and being deliberate. And I've seen this, you
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know, be strong in some places, but it doesn't link to the customer experience.
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And there's very rarely that leadership and task force have that has data information insights and the ability to
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make changes in real time. It's always laggy, right? We do an employee engagement survey or we did an exit
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survey and then somebody synthesizes that and then shares it only to executive leadership and then maybe some of those get prioritized and shared out.
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But it's very rarely exposed. And maybe that's, you know, too strong of a word, but that's kind of how it feels. It's like a little secretive in a lot of ways.
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Yeah. Well, again, so much that I want to unpack here.
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Um, I'm probably going to say that like 20 times throughout this episode.
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Something that came to mind because you were talking about how, you know, in today's world, we need to treat employee like if they're going to exit, like accept that and and and support them in
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their journey. like something that came up and so I'll just say this before I I say the next thing is McKenzie um and I don't know if they're the best example
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but one of the things that have always stood out to me about their culture is that anybody who leaves the company is known as an alumni
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um a Mackenzie alumni and I think that's huge because it's part of what they do is they know that their employees are going to go and be CEOs or whatever and
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they maintain that web of their network and I think there's something so powerful in that in terms of on day one, you know, your employees
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going to leave at some point. So, you you maximize what they get out of the experience and you help them you help kind of tee them up to their next thing
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and then you treat them not as like an exiled person from your business when they leave, but somebody who is an alumni and I think that's so powerful.
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So, that just stood up to me or stood out to me. Um, and I wanted to say that you did say something that I think is important to to tug on a little bit
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because we we're obviously talking about employee experience, but then we're also talking about the candidate journey and the candidate experience. I don't know
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if there's such thing like as like candidate journey mapping.
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Um, there can be journey mapping for anything.
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For anything. Okay. See, this is what I'm saying like anyone who has an experience, we can architect it.
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Okay. Well, so I think like we have to look at employee experience not as again just starting at the moment that you attract a candidate, but really look at
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mapping the candidate experience more and more today because I I don't know how much you're on social media, but um I have my ears to the ground all day
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every day intentionally because I want to hear exactly what people are saying in terms of their experience. And we're talking about people who have submitted
17:07
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hundreds of like resumes and applications, who have been applying and unemployed for 6 months, a year, two
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years, who have gone through interviews that were three, four, five, seven rounds only to get ghosted. Like the
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candidate experience is a whole different ballgame than what it used to be. And if we're not thinking about mapping the employee experience, we're
17:32
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definitely not thinking about mapping the candidate experience, right?
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But everything that happens here in the candidate experience influences what happens here in the employee experience. And it's such we're
Chapter 3: The Candidate Experience
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talking about silos. Like that is the biggest chasm I think that we need to we need to bridge.
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I you know I I think that we can group them. I don't want to say group them together, but to me they are one and the
17:58
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same. And I think that's why when I started to just kind of list out what might be those journey stages that to me
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it's the candidate. So with customer experience journey mapping your your
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first stage is generally awareness, right? So is that potential customer,
18:19
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client, patient, provider, whoever it is, that potential customer, what are they learning about us out in the wild,
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it's the same. So you in that customer journey, there's someone who is not yet a customer. And that's where sales and marketing and you know, how are we
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making sure that what we say matches, then they come in and they make that decision to join, right? We're trying to attract them to join so that then they
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stay with us and grow with us depending on whatever or buy more from us or whatever it is stay members with us. To
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me the candidate piece is that it's you know getting deep into that design within those early stages of the
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employee journey and figuring out what data we can leverage, what we're listening and who we want to be and who we don't want to be. because anything
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above this really low bar that exists right now is going to be better than than what's out there today. And getting creative and thoughtful about that to
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your point, I think that's going to be a huge differentiator and finding talent that really fits in the organization perhaps sticks around for a little bit.
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Well, but remember, you're an you're you are somebody who lives in the ex world.
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Yeah. And like the there are tons of companies who have an HR person or a hiring manager who isn't this isn't even
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on their radar. They're not even thinking about it. So when when we talk about like comparing it to the customer experience, there's a very different
19:43
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intention behind it, right? Like you talk about intention and being deliberate. When we're looking at the the customer experience, there is 10
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times more intent behind it because of the the return that we expect from caring about the customer journey. But
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when we are thinking about the employee experience, not even the candidate experience, but the employee experience, the intent is already lacking there
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compared to customer experience. Compare that now to the candidate experience and I'm going to argue that based on what we're seeing in society today, it's non-existent.
20:17
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Right? And and I'm not saying that it's in it's intentional on the on any organization's side for it to have been
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have to have become what it is now, but it is where it's at. And I think we need to put even more intent on the candidate
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experience than any of the other two because those same candidates are our customers or potentially our customers, right? And that's where the connection
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is that I think as leaders we have to expand our understanding of this whole ecosystem.
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Uh from where do you see the candidate experience being kind of the most broken at the moment? I know I kind of shared
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some. I mean, I don't honestly know if I have the right or even an answer. This kind of will trickle into this new venture that I'm doing. For those of you
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who don't know, I I launched a new venture with my business partner Katie.
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Um, which is about tackling the systems that are in place in the world of work.
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And I think in terms of the candidate experience, that's really where it's broken is we're we're continuing to just
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feed people through this system, this machine that has existed because of the industrial revolution and how we used to do work back then when the world is
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completely different and we're continuing to just expect them to flow through the same machine. Not thinking like on the other side of the table of
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what that feels like. the the daily agony, the daily like crushing of the soul experience that
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everybody millions of people are experiencing or we're aware of it. We know that it's happening, but we're we continue on the same processes using the same systems.
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And I think that's where it's broken. I think it's saying, okay, for our company, let's follow a different system. Forget
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the resume. Let's let's approach this a different way. Forget the way that we're doing interviews. Let's get creative.
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You know what I mean? It's being that deliberate about how we are connecting with people before they're
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coming to us in exchange for productivity.
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Yeah, that's what I think we need to do. And it it sounds on a grand scale like it's a lot of work, like it's a dream vision,
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but really it just comes down to like being more human, right? like treating people with much more dignity and respect through the process. And it's
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not going to be perfect. I'm not saying that you have to reach out to every single person that sends a resume. Like depending on the company, that could be
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impossible. But just having the intention of saying, "Okay, how can I approach this differently so that I'm
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not continuing to just look at the resumes that are come in that are being recommended by ETSs and forget about everybody else?" or if I'm if I reach out to somebody, just not ghost them.
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Just say, "Hey, like here's where I'm at. Like, I'm still waiting to make a decision. Like, give me a couple more days." At least you're keeping the pulse
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and people know that they're not just sending things into the void. Yeah. Yeah. Yes.
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I just unloaded on No, but it's absolutely right. It's funny cuz you know I I listen I listen to that and I think okay well how can we
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sus out some of the like you know have you heard of the five wise it's like diagnose sort of based on right it's like how do we diagnose where it's
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breaking down at some of those places and how fun would it be to take like five organizations and just do some diagnosis a little bit of research and
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say like what do you think's going on cuz like some of the you mentioned signals before right some of the signals in those moments that keep showing up If
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people keep getting ghosted, there's probably a reason. And some maybe it's the leaders have not been given the parameters of what they can say in the
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interviewing process. Maybe it's as simple as they think there's a policy where we can't disclose until we get to a place where we know XYZ or we've run
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into latigious individuals before and so now we can't promise or tell them that we had a good interview because of this.
24:22
24 minutes, 22 seconds
So that I find that you know in these kinds of things in organizations there's probably like some reason over here that then it could help them get to that
24:30
24 minutes, 30 seconds
place and for others who have passion around this you know topic and showing up and being human there's a lot of best
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24 minutes, 38 seconds
practices to to pull from right like culture work different assessments that could happen earlier in an interviewing
24:46
24 minutes, 46 seconds
process I know some are actually approved for hiring but whether I don't think strength finders is but That's such a great one, right? Gallup, there's
24:54
24 minutes, 54 seconds
other things to get to the place of what you're describing, to learn from, to design, and trial and error and see what
25:02
25 minutes, 2 seconds
works. And then probably naturally those who have a good experience, even if they didn't get hired or it wasn't a good
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25 minutes, 10 seconds
fit, they're going to want to talk about that. It's going to feel different.
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25 minutes, 14 seconds
Yeah. I mean, if we think like let's say let's talk specifically about the ghosting thing, right? From a candidate experience standpoint,
25:22
25 minutes, 22 seconds
we know that AI exists. We know that AI has the ability to automate automate tasks. Yeah.
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25 minutes, 30 seconds
It's so easy to put a system in place and like use AI to create to remind you of making more touch points, right? Like
25:39
25 minutes, 39 seconds
to to make sure that you don't forget you were talking to this candidate to remind you to send a quick message, a quick email to say, "Hey, like I'm still
25:47
25 minutes, 47 seconds
I haven't hired anybody yet." like keeping those pulses in place so that it appeases the need for people to know they're not just being ghosted by
25:55
25 minutes, 55 seconds
another organization. Like it's such a simple thing. It takes it'll take a couple minutes to set that system up.
26:00
26 minutes
It's not this entire like large machine that you're having to fix and reinvent.
26:07
26 minutes, 7 seconds
It's one tiny thing, one tiny cog that you're doing a little bit differently that I think can make a huge difference in terms of the candidate experience. So
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26 minutes, 15 seconds
I think it's that it's again going back to the intentionality and being deliberate. You just have to make that choice.
26:22
26 minutes, 22 seconds
That's right. Very very well said. And you can make that choice what you just described.
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26 minutes, 28 seconds
If you have the ears and voice of senior leadership and budget, even if that is very very small, we say we want to show
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26 minutes, 37 seconds
up more thoughtfully. We don't want to ghost anymore. So every leader who's an inner, you know, who's a hiring manager, let's just say
26:45
26 minutes, 45 seconds
all of you, please put this system in place. Here's what you need to know. So it's not left to that one employee who
26:52
26 minutes, 52 seconds
wants to or one leader, one manager who wants to do it, but that's where you can get things at scale and show up better and more consistently together.
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27 minutes, 1 second
Yeah. Because I will say that on you know on the other side of this on the candidate side the way that you are treated by an
27:09
27 minutes, 9 seconds
organization during that candidate experience is a signal of what you might experience as an employee in once you cross over to
27:18
27 minutes, 18 seconds
the employee experience. So, in some ways, you know, maybe you're dodging a bullet. Um, in some ways, I think or in a lot of ways, it misrepresents your
27:26
27 minutes, 26 seconds
business because, you know, candidates are going through this process and they're having this experience with somebody at your organization. And
27:33
27 minutes, 33 seconds
that's the brand equity that gets stuck with them. That's a huge factor that businesses are not realizing is what is
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27 minutes, 42 seconds
the impact of that candidate experience when it is negative?
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27 minutes, 45 seconds
What's the long term? because then when we're talking about NPS or whatever like that person then starts to talk about their negative experience and that
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27 minutes, 52 seconds
touches seven other people and seven other people like and it starts to trickle down. So that's absolutely right. Yeah, there was
28:01
28 minutes, 1 second
a person I met the other day who had I think it was like a second or third interview in person. Had to drive an
28:09
28 minutes, 9 seconds
hour to get there or more in the afternoon like aiming for a potential relocation down here kind of thing. And
28:17
28 minutes, 17 seconds
she gets there and they said, "Oh, we changed the time. Can you come back another day?" Didn't tell her. They said, "Oh, we actually, it turned out we
28:25
28 minutes, 25 seconds
had the wrong contact information. We were tell we told somebody else." So this person did not have the interview,
28:33
28 minutes, 33 seconds
took time, got ready, prepared, showed up. They were not ready for her. And you know, having met her, she she said
28:41
28 minutes, 41 seconds
something. Well, I think it was what you just said. I think I might have just dodged a bullet, moved on from there.
28:48
28 minutes, 48 seconds
Well, that irks me so much. Um, but it's it's a prime example of the Canada experience
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28 minutes, 57 seconds
being so transactional. So let me ask you, you know, from your perspective, why do you think the candidate experience has become so transactional
29:04
29 minutes, 4 seconds
and dehumanized? And if brand activation should start before the hire, how much brand equity are companies burning by
Chapter 4: Transactional and Dehumanized Candidate Experience
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29 minutes, 12 seconds
treating applicants like data points, like tools?
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29 minutes, 16 seconds
I think that's a very very good question. I don't I don't know the answer. I think like a lot of things, it's multironged. You know when there
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29 minutes, 24 seconds
are humans in charge of something all of us are busy all of us are pulled in a lot of directions. Companies are still
29:32
29 minutes, 32 seconds
figure businesses companies are still figuring out how to be efficient but still be thoughtful. They're you know
29:39
29 minutes, 39 seconds
want to grow, want to adapt, want to change. And then when you put something like the candidate journey without it having that platform let's say like
29:48
29 minutes, 48 seconds
other strategic initiatives or efforts or pillars it's just going to be left to the side of someone's desk. Yeah.
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29 minutes, 57 seconds
I think that to me is perhaps an observation but also a hypothesis in a way. Yeah.
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30 minutes, 6 seconds
Right. Just from what I've observed.
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uh some are doing it really well. Like I just want to say that those who do think strategically and have passion and have
30:18
30 minutes, 18 seconds
a voice, a seat at the table during let's say budget planning or strategic planning. They recognize it. They
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30 minutes, 26 seconds
recognize what you had mentioned like you're going to lose people. They're not going to be fans. If they were customers, they're probably not anymore.
30:33
30 minutes, 33 seconds
Like they recognize some of those things. And on the flip side, when you think about how engaged employees do produce and how those who feel like they
30:42
30 minutes, 42 seconds
belong, you know, the performance increases and team dynamics when it's healthy and everyone's thriving and
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30 minutes, 50 seconds
humming along, there's more innovation and we could go on and on for like the uptick and what you were kind of sharing like with employee engagement. When that
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30 minutes, 58 seconds
is at a high level, company's going to do well, right? The business Yeah. you know, whether it's in the commercial space, nonprofit, anything.
31:05
31 minutes, 5 seconds
When people feel good feel good in their jobs once they get there in the door, then that's just going to make everything do better. And
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31 minutes, 13 seconds
yeah, I think just to answer, you know, additionally, what I notice is that very
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31 minutes, 20 seconds
very few organizations are fully aligned on how they want to show up. And that is both for employees and for customers.
31:29
31 minutes, 29 seconds
And in my opinion, those things need to go hand inand because we're delivering something in all moments. Everybody eventually touches something that our
31:37
31 minutes, 37 seconds
customers or clients or end clients or whoever experience. Very very rarely do I enter an organization or have even
31:44
31 minutes, 44 seconds
lived and they have that phrase that says we build trust or we do this or we show up with clarity or whatever those
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31 minutes, 53 seconds
things are that match your brand. very few of them have that let alone the behaviors that help everyone understand
32:00
32 minutes
how to show up together and I have seen this work very well and just very quickly there's a very very large
32:09
32 minutes, 9 seconds
organization second in market the beginning of a service and operations transformation we put in that
32:16
32 minutes, 16 seconds
northstar experiential northstar I had the opportunity to chat with one of those leaders working on another project but with one of those leaders and
32:25
32 minutes, 25 seconds
without him realizing that I was there for the beginning, which is kind of my favorite moment. I feel like it was like secret secret shopper moment, you know.
32:32
32 minutes, 32 seconds
Um, he said, "Oh, we put in this, we did this at the beginning of the transformation." Our NPS went from I don't let's just say negative 15 to plus
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32 minutes, 41 seconds
20 because we had that clarity and the reinforcement about how we show up for each other, which boosted accountability, how people feel, and how
32:50
32 minutes, 50 seconds
they show up and make decisions. And it just moved the needle so significantly that the customers were feeling it as well as the employees.
32:59
32 minutes, 59 seconds
Last season we talked a lot about alignment. We explored that with our different guests. This season we're really exploring engagement and the relationship from alignment to
33:08
33 minutes, 8 seconds
engagement. Before I pivot to that, I do want to acknowledge what we're talking about here like is important. And both
33:16
33 minutes, 16 seconds
Natalie and I obviously recognize that it's a lot of work that and as leaders as as managers our capacity is so thin
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33 minutes, 26 seconds
in today's world. So I will recognize that but I will also say that employee experience and journey mapping it's all
33:34
33 minutes, 34 seconds
so rooted in good leadership and again being intentional. And so to an extent I will say to any leader there's a certain
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33 minutes, 43 seconds
level of responsibility that comes with being in that type of role that even when your capacity is thin there has to
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33 minutes, 51 seconds
be a little bit of intentionality of I'm still going to put effort towards this because the people in the organizations
33:58
33 minutes, 58 seconds
are the people who are driving the business forward. That's so corporate speak but they're the people who are helping to make things happen and
34:06
34 minutes, 6 seconds
they're investing their time their energy their resources. the same way that you are. But as a leader, you have an added responsibility to make sure
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34 minutes, 14 seconds
that they're having a positive experience that what they're doing is not for not that it's for something meaningful. And so, you know, I I do
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34 minutes, 23 seconds
just want to recognize before we dive into this next uh next part that yes, being in a leadership role, having a
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responsibility of thinking about the employee experience is a big responsibility.
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34 minutes, 36 seconds
But if you are a leader, it's your job, right?
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34 minutes, 42 seconds
And getting curious, I think, is part of it too, right? You don't know or you don't have the the definitions behind it
34:50
34 minutes, 50 seconds
or or perhaps you're not in a people leader role, not maybe where you want to be. I totally get that too, right? You
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34 minutes, 58 seconds
can still be curious and kind of raise your hand and say, "I've been reading about this thing or I've heard about this thing. Are we doing that? Can we look into that? It takes just one person's voice sometimes.
35:08
35 minutes, 8 seconds
Yeah, 100%. So, you you started to talk about how this relates or how this influences employee engagement. So, I want to pivot to that because that is
35:16
35 minutes, 16 seconds
kind of the critical part of this conversation. My guest for next week, Casey Divine, he told me something profound. He said, "I can be aligned
35:23
35 minutes, 23 seconds
with and believe in a company's mission and their vision without being engaged enough to contribute to it." And I think that that is such a powerful thing when
Chapter 5: The Power of Curiosity and Questions
35:32
35 minutes, 32 seconds
you think about it because, you know, we're talking about alignment. Um, we think it's enough for people to say, "Oh yeah, I share the same values. Oh yeah,
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35 minutes, 39 seconds
I I see this vision. I share it." And then think that that's enough to get an employee to come to work every day
35:46
35 minutes, 46 seconds
excited. But it's not. There is work that you as a leader and even you as an employee.
35:51
35 minutes, 51 seconds
There's work you have to do every day to feel engaged enough to want to then contribute to those things that you feel
36:00
36 minutes
so aligned with. But that is the gap. I can believe it right. I can have alignment but if the system is full of
36:06
36 minutes, 6 seconds
friction, I can't act. Which is where that engagement comes into play. Is this where journey mapping comes in? Is the
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36 minutes, 14 seconds
map essentially the tool that removes the friction? so that your alignment can actually turn into engagement into contribution.
36:24
36 minutes, 24 seconds
I think that is a fantastic place to begin to find alignment. And
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36 minutes, 33 seconds
there are some ingredients that go into doing that in a way that people feel employees, leaders,
36:42
36 minutes, 42 seconds
whoever feel like they're a part of it, which in my opinion when done well, that's really critically important. Uh
36:51
36 minutes, 51 seconds
some hear journey mapping they think oh it's like that product map that we had when we did user experience. No sure it
36:58
36 minutes, 58 seconds
can be but it's not meant to be a one-time exercise. I'll just say like right it's meant to be something that's
37:06
37 minutes, 6 seconds
iterative. It's meant to be collaborative and crossf functional. It is something that best to do with a
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37 minutes, 14 seconds
third party because that person can facilitate without sitting in the room with any political bias,
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37 minutes, 21 seconds
bias, no ownership, no baggage, nothing. They just want to see and you know, I highly recommend someone
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37 minutes, 28 seconds
who has this, you know, CX ex strategic mindset to be able to facilitate and
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37 minutes, 34 seconds
listen between the lines. Um, so yes, and I can't help but sort of say those
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like caveats and things because it doesn't always work when it's not done thoughtfully. So when it's done
37:49
37 minutes, 49 seconds
well, then yes, if you could bring employees together and give everybody a voice to
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37 minutes, 57 seconds
say, you know, for me personally, like when I do work, I like to meet one-on-one with as many people as I can, right? with increment. I want to listen
38:05
38 minutes, 5 seconds
and not only listen in a structured way that that maybe doesn't feel structured for those I'm interviewing, but it's kind of like there's a method to the
38:13
38 minutes, 13 seconds
madness. I want to listen. I want to listen between the lines. I want to hear. I want to build trust because well, one, it's more
38:20
38 minutes, 20 seconds
fun for me to work with people who when we have a rapport, but secondly, like everybody deserves a voice and share the things they've been thinking about. So
38:28
38 minutes, 28 seconds
if we can go into some kind of a journey mapping session for the employee journey
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38 minutes, 35 seconds
with those team members that you feel that feel a part of it and then map each stage together thinking well what stages
38:44
38 minutes, 44 seconds
are actually right for our organization and let's dig into every single one of those and why not use that kind of
38:52
38 minutes, 52 seconds
company journey to align what's happening externally with internally.
38:57
38 minutes, 57 seconds
And that is part of the customer experience professional association discipline to kind of be able to put those things handinand. But there's a
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39 minutes, 5 seconds
moment to just get everybody comfortable with the full landscape. They're going to know right away where they fit in that. But they're also going to know what's happening before and after and
39:14
39 minutes, 14 seconds
what to expect and where there's friction and always always pull data in and how are we measuring. But don't keep
39:21
39 minutes, 21 seconds
it just for this room. you know, I would say share it. When people aren't a part of those kinds of sessions, they feel a
39:28
39 minutes, 28 seconds
little left out or unheard. And then if they're not caught up, that's not going to that's not going to work. So, I think permission to say this is not a secret.
39:37
39 minutes, 37 seconds
We know that there are things that we need to go fix that will lead to just from going through that process alone will lead to better engagement. And then
39:45
39 minutes, 45 seconds
if it's not, and I hear this all the time in organizations, all different sizes. Everyone was so engaged and so
39:52
39 minutes, 52 seconds
excited and so happy and motivated and then we went back to our day-to-day and you know, maybe change.
39:58
39 minutes, 58 seconds
So there's there's a way to do this that you can keep it put make it a part of the ecosystem and then
40:06
40 minutes, 6 seconds
don't forget it. you're gonna change your language a little bit, but it will I think it's like it will lead to more engagement because you're talking about
40:13
40 minutes, 13 seconds
their day-to-day, right? Um tempted to get into change management because I think that's applicable to you, but I'll pause there.
40:20
40 minutes, 20 seconds
Well, I'm going to note that down because I do there is much we can talk about change management. Um I will emphasize from what Natalie just said
40:27
40 minutes, 27 seconds
the importance the significance the impact of having a third party involved in this whole process because you know
40:35
40 minutes, 35 seconds
we talk about the parallels between customer experience and employee experience and like customer there's customer reviews right and if a customer
40:44
40 minutes, 44 seconds
leaves a bad review they tell the truth which they they do most of the time they tell the truth about their experience they don't get in most situations they
40:53
40 minutes, 53 seconds
don't they're reprimanded for that. They don't there's no repercussions. In fact, typically an a customer tells the truth about their negative experience and we reward them.
Chapter 6: Creating Engagement and Change Management
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41 minutes, 2 seconds
We say come back with here's a free thing, here's a discount. And it's so the opposite when it comes to the employee experience. If somebody tells
41:10
41 minutes, 10 seconds
the truth, nine times out of 10, I would I shouldn't say nine times, seven times out of 10 maybe is more accurate, the manager is not going to be like, "Oh,
41:18
41 minutes, 18 seconds
tell me more." Right? Like so many managers like at least maybe at least from the employee perspective there's a fear because they know that there's a
41:27
41 minutes, 27 seconds
chance they'll be reprimanded. There's a chance that there'll be this superficial maybe conversation that is more for um
41:35
41 minutes, 35 seconds
due diligence or compliance than actually wanting to learn the truth. And so having a third party involved might provide a little additional layer of
41:44
41 minutes, 44 seconds
psychological safety where your employees might feel more um apt to to be honest and tell the truth and not be
41:52
41 minutes, 52 seconds
afraid of the repercussions. Though I will say some employees are still probably hesitant um and assume that you
41:59
41 minutes, 59 seconds
as a business consultant would go and report that to the company. But I think naturally there's a lay there's a
42:06
42 minutes, 6 seconds
different trust layer um that is there with a third party organization which is huge because again when you're think when you're talking about
42:14
42 minutes, 14 seconds
really understanding the truth behind the employee experience it's very hard to do it when it's all done in house because the employees I
42:23
42 minutes, 23 seconds
think are very hesitant. They're very guarded. Um so they're not necessarily honest all the time. But you can give me your thoughts on that.
42:30
42 minutes, 30 seconds
Yeah, I I agree with that. And of course, systemically, what does the culture look like? What have we allowed
42:39
42 minutes, 39 seconds
and rewarded internally before? And you know, how is it a toxic culture? Is it
42:46
42 minutes, 46 seconds
not? So, it's hard for leaders probably to kind of look at that and say like, are we ready to do that? Are we ready to
42:54
42 minutes, 54 seconds
listen? Uh that's kind of one part of it versus like we know that we want to get better and this is one way that we're
43:02
43 minutes, 2 seconds
going to start listening as you know a key word we're going to start listening in a different way or in a more thoughtful way or we started this
43:10
43 minutes, 10 seconds
grassroots let's listen more I will say like as a facilitator sure there's a
43:17
43 minutes, 17 seconds
responsibility to say if you're interviewing employees you know I'm not going to share quotes I'm not going to share what you said unless unless you
43:25
43 minutes, 25 seconds
tell me that you want me to or that's okay. And if there is something that feels like I need to share it, I'm I'm
43:33
43 minutes, 33 seconds
going to have to share it, right? If there's something really extreme, um it really depends what it is. But, you
43:41
43 minutes, 41 seconds
know, I think it's a really really good point that it it also is little test and learn and a little practice, right?
43:48
43 minutes, 48 seconds
We're listening in a different way and our ears are open and oh my gosh, we might make changes. that is people are skeptical I think naturally of that if
43:55
43 minutes, 55 seconds
they haven't seen that before and people get deflated when the ideas that they've had saw no light a day
44:04
44 minutes, 4 seconds
and also I hope that that third party can embrace the fact that they're coming in to listen they're not here to take
44:12
44 minutes, 12 seconds
any credit for anything it's those those teams and employees they know where they need to head and honoring those voices I think is also really important Yeah.
44:22
44 minutes, 22 seconds
Okay. Well, if you're a business leader listening and you're sitting there thinking, "Yeah, maybe I should have hired a third party, Natalie's your
44:29
44 minutes, 29 seconds
girl." Um, quick shameless plug. Now, I do want to play a little bit of devil's advocate because I I've looked at a journey map. Um, and if you are
44:37
44 minutes, 37 seconds
listening to this right now, maybe this is an invitation to pause, go to Google, and just Google either employee journey map, customer journey map, just so you can have a visual idea. But when you
44:46
44 minutes, 46 seconds
look at a full journey map with all the swim lanes and touch points, it can look very overwhelming. So a small business
44:54
44 minutes, 54 seconds
owner, for example, might look at that diagram and say, "Nope, too complex. I can't do that." Um, but at its core,
45:01
45 minutes, 1 second
isn't this just about treating people like people? Like, is this process something that can be simplified? Is it really just common sense codified into a system?
45:13
45 minutes, 13 seconds
Yeah, I think ultimately and I don't know if that was rhetorical, Clarence, because you're absolutely right. Right.
45:19
45 minutes, 19 seconds
But I my questions are never rhetorical.
45:22
45 minutes, 22 seconds
I think like I you know for me it's kind of sharing well that's a way to do this comprehensively to get everybody's
45:30
45 minutes, 30 seconds
voices in across different give everyone a platform to speak and feel safe and share things. I think the to your point
45:39
45 minutes, 39 seconds
the minimum is saying well what are those stages and kind of how are we doing it today like at minimum just get a pulse on what's happening current
45:47
45 minutes, 47 seconds
state or if somebody said oh no we need to do better we know this is broken great then just name your stages and say we know this thing is broken let's click
45:55
45 minutes, 55 seconds
down and map every single every single every single step in there so we can lean in um so that even a simplified
46:03
46 minutes, 3 seconds
version is a visual that works for a lot of people to just be able to say I'm this nebulous thing is feels broken. Let
46:11
46 minutes, 11 seconds
me physically point to where this thing is.
46:15
46 minutes, 15 seconds
Yeah, I have found that to be in its like on its own really really helpful because it gives a frame for people and it feels less scary
46:23
46 minutes, 23 seconds
when you're putting it like it's container almost, right? And then you're not it's not a guessing game every time.
46:30
46 minutes, 30 seconds
Well, yeah, that's that's the thing, right? rather than that's what's the alternative? You just play it by ear, go with the flow every time.
46:40
46 minutes, 40 seconds
Right. Right.
46:41
46 minutes, 41 seconds
Um so we touched on this a little bit earlier, but I want to bring it back because I think this is important in today's digital age. I want to zoom in more on kind of this before stage
46:50
46 minutes, 50 seconds
because traditional mapping looks again at recruitment essentially, right? But today employees are looking at brand presence. They're looking at, you know,
46:58
46 minutes, 58 seconds
founder brands. Um are companies building in public? Do they have content on LinkedIn? Long before they apply um
47:06
47 minutes, 6 seconds
long before they even consider working for the company. How do we map this new before? How do companies account for the fact that their employee experience is
47:14
47 minutes, 14 seconds
actually happening on social media feeds for months before a candidate ever even connects with HR or anybody at that company.
47:25
47 minutes, 25 seconds
Yeah. I mean, perhaps we're getting back to where things have been fragmented, right? If those who are putting out the
47:33
47 minutes, 33 seconds
brand messaging or celebrating the founder story or sharing how we're giving back or
47:40
47 minutes, 40 seconds
highlighting like whatever those things are, what else do we need to bring in to show a little bit more about what it's
47:49
47 minutes, 49 seconds
like to be a part of that or for those employees? I think those conversations aren't always happening together or there's not always the data to kind of put in there together.
48:00
48 minutes
Um, sometimes it's what you're saying about like there just it's not set up that way today. We say we might have a
48:07
48 minutes, 7 seconds
landing page about what our benefits are and how we treat our employees and there's training, but I love what you
48:15
48 minutes, 15 seconds
just said because they're there. It's it's all about that impression and so much of that employee experience and
48:22
48 minutes, 22 seconds
customer experience is perception, right? It's how people they're perceiving us. That's the reality. And perception is reality.
48:31
48 minutes, 31 seconds
Yeah. So, how are you going to be thoughtful about that and make it feel genuine? So, hopefully it's genuine.
48:39
48 minutes, 39 seconds
I wonder if this touches a little bit to like generationally.
48:43
48 minutes, 43 seconds
Uh, I've been reading I haven't I wish I had the title of the book, but someone recommended to me a a Jenzie
48:50
48 minutes, 50 seconds
book just to kind of read. It's a little bit of research and a little bit of how to show up. And I it's been an
48:57
48 minutes, 57 seconds
interesting read. Um but I people are very very educated, aware, curious and
49:05
49 minutes, 5 seconds
have a different style of working, a different preference that doesn't match the other ways of working. And so
49:13
49 minutes, 13 seconds
there's going to be friction there, not only in talking about it, but in which you started I think some of our conversation with like once somebody
49:20
49 minutes, 20 seconds
gets in the door and they don't think it's necessary to work 8 10 hours a day and you can produce outcomes faster.
49:28
49 minutes, 28 seconds
Well, that's not celebrated in a lot of cases. No.
49:32
49 minutes, 32 seconds
So there's like a whole other I think topic there.
49:38
49 minutes, 38 seconds
We we can dive into so much Natalie all tying back to employee experience and honestly like so I asked that previous question because you know as an example
49:46
49 minutes, 46 seconds
for myself like Apple I have never like necessarily submitted a resume to Apple but I would love to work there one day. I've
49:54
49 minutes, 54 seconds
dreamt about working there one day and that's because of the brand experience that I get with them as a customer. Um,
50:01
50 minutes, 1 second
and the fact that, you know, at least on the surface level, maybe the culture is so evident and it just feels so aligned
50:10
50 minutes, 10 seconds
with the kind of culture that I would want to work in. So, you know, for you as a listener, like I would challenge you to think about companies that you've thought about how much you'd love
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50 minutes, 18 seconds
working there even though you've never necessarily applied there. Like that's exactly what we're talking about here in terms of that brand activation happening
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50 minutes, 27 seconds
even way before an employee relationship occurs. Um, and honestly, maybe even
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50 minutes, 34 seconds
never like that maybe that employee relationship never happens, but in the event that it does, there's already been this like predicated premise, whatever,
Chapter 7: Understanding the Employee Journey
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50 minutes, 44 seconds
um, of that brand activation. So that when the candidate or customer crosses over, crosses that line, you're already
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50 minutes, 52 seconds
off to a much stronger start than Yeah.
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50 minutes, 57 seconds
any other situation. You know what I mean?
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50 minutes, 59 seconds
Oh my gosh, it's such a Yeah. Such a great a great point and it's like there's a moment to say well one why not
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51 minutes, 7 seconds
set that goal and go learn more and go do the thing because you say a thing happen right so there's that side of it
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51 minutes, 15 seconds
and then there's a second side okay so then what do we believe that those key ingredients or enablers are within those
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51 minutes, 24 seconds
organizations that seem to live and breathe their culture externally as well as internally,
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51 minutes, 31 seconds
is it training, how are they doing it, is it leadership, what are those things that really stand out? So, like we kind of can say, you know, we these are the
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51 minutes, 39 seconds
ways to boost employee engagement. These are the ways to get people aligned.
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51 minutes, 42 seconds
These are the ways too for those ones that in your example, it's like a standout organization that has grown and
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51 minutes, 50 seconds
has been consistent with their brand and you can tell that decisions were made deep in the organization from packaging to this to that to the stores, right?
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51 minutes, 58 seconds
That's like it's cohesive. So then what do they do? Is it alignment? Is it training? Is it reinforcement? Is it
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