Feature
The focus of employee experience has changed over the years. Before the pandemic, experience was largely seen as a recruiting and retention issue. Employers invested in office amenities, wellness programs and recognition platforms, and considered employee engagement scores to be a key metric.
Employers’ efforts have more recently shifted from a focus on perks and surface-level engagement to something much more structural: how work is designed, how managers lead and how technology shapes employees’ day-to-day reality.
The solution is to look on employee experience as something that’s embedded in work, not layered on top of it. That’s true for a company’s approach to technology as well as management.
Employee Engagement, Changing with the Times
Traditionally, the annual employee engagement survey was the primary instrument for gauging employee sentiment. Today, experts believe effectively managing experience requires a continuous conversation based on real-time signals, shorter feedback loops and frequent communication. SHRM’s 2025 State of the Workplace Research Report stated experience isn't simply about perks or happiness, but about whether employees see their workplace as cooperative, collegial and constructive.
How employees experience their jobs day-to-day contributes to productivity and retention. When technology solutions are slow, clunky or disconnected, workers get frustrated and feel they have less influence on their jobs.
The Link Between Employee Experience and Technology
Recognizing that, more employers are embedding employee experience in work itself. Creating an experience that fits how employees work requires rethinking how they move through systems, how managers communicate, how workflows progress and how much friction exists in everyday work. As AI is woven into HR and workplace systems, employees’ perceptions of fairness, transparency and control determine whether it boosts or undermines well-being. AI lightens the pressure on workers, researchers say, but only when they understand what the system is doing and why.
This means employee experience and technology are linked. Fortunately, organizations recognize the influence their technology infrastructure has.
- While leaders tend to overestimate the effect and usability of their tech stack, employees report persistent challenges, according to Ivanti's Digital Employee Experience Report. Integrations are choppy, workflows force duplicate actions and “solutions” make a job more — not less — difficult to perform.
- Organizations that personalize experience through better systems, improved manager interactions and transparent workflows see gains in engagement and productivity, according to HR software provider Empxtrack. The company’s research found personalized experiences improve engagement by 30% and productivity by 20%.
- Learning and development is another factor, especially at a time of rapidly evolving skills. Only about 12% of HR leaders now connect workforce planning to skills strategy, stated McKinsey. But the link is important: Employees see the ability to grow as an important component of their experience. That indicates factors such as culture and solutions are important, but don’t represent the complete equation.
In a sense, employee experience has become an operating system that includes culture, technology, psychology, workflow design and management behavior. All of this influences how employees view their work, and whether they believe their company values their time, well-being and talent. So, not surprisingly, it has an obvious impact on whether they stay, perform or check out.
HR's Strategic Imperative
To be effective amidst all this, employers must recognize that HR and people management is no longer about running the workforce and overseeing processes. HR should take the lead on developing experiences, identifying friction and building trust around every system employees use. Managers must understand the systems their teams depend on. They need to be present not only on Zoom or Slack, but in the rhythms of their team.
The trick is to map an employee’s important moments in the way a product manager maps a customer journey. Onboarding should be less about paperwork and more about simplicity and clarity. Workflows should be designed around the realities of the tech stack, not its promise. Avoid bright, shiny objects. And improve feedback mechanisms so managers respond to employee issues before those issues turn into problems — and resignations.
Meanwhile, HR must evolve from an administrative into a strategic mindset, shifting from deploying systems to designing experiences. Deploying technology isn’t enough. Tools must be reliable, tailored to employees and integrated into workflows. HR needs to lead the conversation around how work is structured, how tools enable or deter productivity and how employees experience working with digital tools.
HR must also become better-versed in the use of data and analytics. With so much of the employee’s day tracked by digital platforms, annual surveys need to give way to data on real-time system usage, tool performance and employee feedback and behavior. The goal isn’t so much about deploying tools as it is improving the experience of work.
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Finally, HR must also consider change management and the human side of technology adoption. HR needs to guide technology transitions to ensure transparency and support. Human-centered design comes into play here. Technology and human workflows should consider how the employee experiences them as much as they affect the ability to get things done and generate results.
EX Is Just Part of Daily Work
As employee experience becomes embedded in technology and work, HR must address three challenges simultaneously: helping shape tools and workflows, ensuring that technology doesn’t get in the employees’ way and using data to link workforce issues to business results. By keeping these high on their priority list, HR keeps up with changes taking place in employee experience.
During 2026, companies that view employee experience as a strategic issue will come out ahead. They’ll recognize that experience is about more than surveys and occasional check-ins. They’ll see experience as something they measure, link to business results and even design. Those that continue to see experience as just nuts-and-bolts will spend their time chasing unrealistic survey scores.
Editor's Note: For more tips on improving employee engagement and experience:
- AI-Era Employee Surveys Need an Action Architecture, Not Just Better Data — Companies are upgrading employee surveys with AI, yet the same problem remains: plenty of data, almost no follow-through.
- Rethinking Internal Communications Channels for Belonging — Too many channels, not enough clarity: why workplace communication is failing and what companies are doing to rebuild trust and connection.
- The Failure of the Employee Engagement Industrial Complex, Part 1 — Despite billions spent on tools, perks and programs, global employee engagement has barely improved in 15 years. This is an opportunity for leaders.
