The Employee Experience Advantage

CHAPTER 20The Employee Experience Pyramid

I like to think of employee experience as a pyramid that has various tiers that sit on top of one another (see Figure 20.1).

Figure 20.1 The Employee Experience Pyramid

At the base of the pyramid, we have the Reason for Being, which provides the foundation for how the organization approaches and thinks about employee experience. The Reason for Being is ultimately what connects the people to the organization. For example, look at the Reason for Being for Starbucks (a preExperiential Organization), which is “To inspire and nurture the human spirit – one person, one cup, and one neighborhood at a time.” When an organization makes a statement like that, you can and should expect that it has an attitude of caring about its people. Of course, there are plenty of exceptions to this. Look at Apple, which scored in the Experiential Category yet has absolutely no Reason for Being. Its current mission statement is: “Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store.”

Compare that with the Reason for Being Steve Jobs first instilled at the company in the 1980s, which was “To make a contribution to the world by making tools for the mind that advance humankind.”

Those are two radical statements and commitments ...