Building the enterprise and the Employee Experience

This is a sentimental post, a point, and an homage to ideas that have inspired me since I was a very young person.

Star Trek. Yes, it has inspired many people in many fields. From astronauts to engineers to civil rights leaders. I became an especially passionate fan when Star Trek: The Next Generation started. I was immediately drawn to the notion of a future where humanity, along with cultures from across the galaxy, worked together for the betterment of all. To this day, I credit STNG with my love of technology, my curiosity and love of learning, oh… AND, one of my core beliefs when it comes to building a successful enterprise.

Happy Employees Make Happy Customers

There is a considerable amount of writing on the value of having excited, motivated employees. Author and Speaker Simon Sinek is one of the more prolific proponents of the idea that happy employees make happy customers. In Sooner Safer Happier by Jonathan Smart, a key concept of delivering with outcomes that align to agile principles and values is psychological safety. So, what does this have to do with Star Trek? And what is my core belief?

The Employee Experience Should Feel Like Walking onto the Bridge of the Enterprise

With the tools and technology available today, every organization should aspire to make every employee experience feel amazing. In fact, it’s foundational to showing that the organization is committed to living its Mission, Vision, and Values. Another way to think about it is, the employee experience is the actions backing up the words put on the wall.

Onboarding

You only get one chance to make a first impression. I’d like to take you through a short envisioning exercise:

Imagine, you work at a large company. Great benefits, comfortable salary, great manager, great colleagues. But something is missing. You want to be part of something new, something exciting. You decide to join an up-and-coming startup.

They have a promising product, impressive customer base. They offer you a decent salary and a nice chunk of equity to make the leap. You decide to take the leap. You sign the offer, you give in your 30 days notice, and then…

• …You wait 4 weeks and hear nothing.
• The day before you are supposed to start, you get a phone call from the receptionist. She asks for your employment information. She instructs you to show up at 9:00 am the next day at the office.
• You show up at 9:00 am, the office is in a nondescript industrial building. You finally find the door to the company’s office area. There is nobody there yet.
• At 9:15 someone finally arrives. They ask who you’re waiting for, you reply, “It’s my first day… I’m the new head of customer success.” The person looks at you with a blank stare, shrugs, and lets you in the door.
• At 10:00 the HR director rushes in. Hands you what looks like a hand-me-down laptop with a set of printed instructions. She apologizes and says the CEO is running late today. She suggests getting your computer set up while you wait.
• You sit down at the conference room table, you open up the laptop, notice there are crumbs in the keyboard. The laptop screen springs out of sleep mode. The screen indicates that the last user, who looks to have been the admin, has locked the computer.
• You attempt to enter in the password off the paper you’re provided. It’s rejected.
• After several more failed attempts, the battery low message appears briefly, and the laptop shuts down.
• You notice water dripping from a pipe onto the floor across the conference room.

How are you feeling about your big leap?

Today, the technology exists to turn an employee’s first days with any sized company into an experience that evokes confidence, excitement, and even joy. That feeling of walking into something that minimizes friction and creates the feeling of connectedness and purpose, or as I like to think about it… our goal as IT leaders in an organization is for that person to feel like they just walked onto the bridge of the enterprise.

Consider this alternative scenario:

• After accepting the offer, you receive a communication to your personal email that provides a secure link to complete the necessary HR and Direct Deposit forms.
• Upon completing the online forms, you receive a communication that lets you know the HR information was received, and that your company login and email will be activated 2 weeks before your first day.
• 2 weeks before your first day, you receive an invitation to connect to your new email. A wizard walks you through setting your password and configuring multi-factor authentication.
• You successfully log in to your new email.
• 1 week before your first day, you receive a laptop shipped directly from a tier-one computer vendor. You open the box, remove the new laptop from the packaging, plug it in, and turn it on.
• The laptop startup experience asks for your home Wi-Fi information. After you enter it, the laptop works for a few moments and then displays “Welcome to your new company.” It also displays your name and a prompt for your password.
• You enter the password that you set up the week before, along with confirming an MFA prompt. The laptop works for a few minutes letting you know it’s setting up initial settings and installing applications.
• After about 20 minutes, you are presented with a desktop, the company logo is displayed on the background, the key business applications that you need are installed. You can open your email and you see a message from HR with instructions for your first day.
• The email explains where to park and then how to find the reception area of the office with a map.
• Since you opted to set up a company mobile number on your personal phone, you receive a QR code via email. You scan the QR code and your company mobile SIM is installed automatically in seconds.
• You receive instructions on how to set up email on your phone a few minutes later.
• On your first day, you arrive at 9:00 am, you park, and quickly find the office. You’re greeted in reception by the HR director. They welcome you and let you know that you should set up in a conference room.
• You receive a communication from the CEO… it says, “Apologies for running late on your first day, I just got pulled into an important client call, I’ll brief you all about it when I’m done in about 20 minutes. I’m happy you’re here as this is exactly the stuff I need you to handle soon.”
• You situate yourself in the conference room, open your laptop, and log on. You see a meeting invite pop up in your email that was just forwarded from the CEO. The subject: “I know you just started, but I’d love to get you into this call to meet this customer.”
• You click the link, the meeting software opens, and you pop into the customer meeting. You’re introduced as the new head of customer success, the CEO announces how happy he is to have you join the team.
• You notice water dripping from a pipe onto the floor across the conference room.

Now, how do you feel about your big leap?

A good onboarding experience can make the difference between someone spending the first weeks of their new job processing feelings of regret and anxiety as they struggle to gain context and understanding, or being focused on learning about the real challenges the company needs to solve and feeling welcome, connected, and motivated.

The experience must create a sense of enablement; it should flow from creating accounts to unboxing a new computer to having applications become available as they are needed, to training requirements being clear and easy to complete.

The Ongoing Experience

First impressions are critical, but the ongoing experience is also going to play an important role in keeping an organization motivated and productive. Concepts like making sure you have single sign-on and automated application provisioning isn’t just important for security, it reduces IT administration overhead, helps with licensing cost control, and creates a coherent user experience that makes your applications feel more like a fabric and less like a fragmented collection of tools.

A Well Executed Technology Strategy Can Make It Feel Like You’re Walking into the Future…

No organization is perfect, and all will have their challenges as they grow, adapt to new business realities, and figure out where they fit in the market. Making it frictionless for people in the organization to get value out of the IT infrastructure will empower people to focus on the real business challenges and not be blocked by what feels like trivial IT problems. There is no bigger frustration than a minor IT issue blocking a critical business success. If this post resonates with you, or you just want to talk about how cool it was to see the old Enterprise Bridge in Picard Season 3, don’t hesitate to schedule time with me!

If you’re a Star Trek fan, here is a great behind the scenes moment with our favorite acting ensign ©️ notice¹