Editorial
Research Report
The ROI of Employee Experience
Employee experience (EX) is an emerging discipline, with countless ideas circulating around how to get it right. Some of them bring real value and will stand the test of time. Others will hold your organization back.
Below are seven misconceptions — the “elephants in the room” — that can easily derail any EX initiative if left unchallenged.
Table of Contents
- 1. Copy the CX Blueprint
- 2. The Employee Journey Myth
- 3. 'Moments That Matter' — But Which Ones?
- 4. Digital: The Missing Backbone
- 5. The ROI Trap
- 6. The Centralization Problem
- 7. Designed in Isolation
- A Better Alternative
1. Copy the CX Blueprint
Customer experience (CX) has existed far longer than EX, so it’s tempting to assume that we can simply repurpose CX approaches for employees.
Let’s test this assumption through a simple example.
Think about a company that manufactures cars. On the customer side, we can identify a handful of customer segments and predictable journey: awareness, consideration, purchase, servicing and eventually, disposal.
Now compare that to the employee experience. Your workforce may include hundreds of job titles, spread across dozens of locations and hundreds of departments, using a multitude of apps and complex equipment, assembling more than 15,000 components. An operator on the shop floor will have a completely different experience from someone working in Finance, Sales or Product Design.
This level of complexity is several orders of magnitude greater than what we typically see in CX. While high-level measures like NPS may provide value, most CX tools will not deliver meaningful results in a reasonable timeframe at this scale.
In short: EX requires dedicated tools and approaches. CX frameworks simply aren’t built for this level of internal complexity, at least not across an entire workforce.
2. The Employee Journey Myth
Employee journeys can provide structure and value. I’ve worked extensively on recruitment, onboarding, induction, performance management, training and separation, and each plays a meaningful role in shaping an employee’s experience.
But let’s be honest: these moments account for less than 10% of the time employees spend at work each year. The remaining 90% — the actual work employees were hired to do —receives little to no attention.
This imbalance is a major limitation. Employee journeys are a good starting point, but EX cannot stop there. The day-to-day work experience matters far more than isolated moments.
3. 'Moments That Matter' — But Which Ones?
“Moments that matter” absolutely do matter — yet probably a better name for it is “moments all employees have in common that matter,” in this order.
Many of the most impactful moments for an employee are unique to particular roles. Because a large number of employees don’t experience them, they are often deprioritized.
A few examples:
- I’m a machine operator and the machine breaks down — how fast does maintenance respond?
- I’m a delivery driver and I’ve been in an accident — how well does Fleet Management support me?
- I’m in Sales and just landed a big order — can Logistics deliver on time?
- I’m in a high-pressure project — does the project manager structure information well, or am I overwhelmed?
These role-specific, operational moments may matter just as much, if not more, than universal ones — and ignoring them severely limits EX impact.
4. Digital: The Missing Backbone
I recently read a 300 page book on Employee Experience. It was excellent — well-researched, well-written by passionate people — but it dedicated fewer than three pages to digital.
A significant portion of workplace interactions now happen through digital tools. Digital is not a footnote; it should be the backbone of the modern employee experience.
Ignoring digital isn't just an oversight — it’s a structural flaw.
5. The ROI Trap
A common EX narrative is: “Engaged employees drive better business results.”
Higher engagement correlates with lower absenteeism, lower attrition, improved productivity, better customer experience and more innovation. Executives know this — many of them have been employees themselves — so this argument can work well during the initial pitch for EX investment.
The problem?
- Eventually, you’ll be asked to show real returns. EX initiatives tend to be specific, while the benefits are broad and hard to attribute directly.
- You cannot use the same justification twice. If you claimed last year that your initiatives would reduce attrition or improve productivity, you can’t use the same argument calculation again the following year. Those benefits should already have materialized.
There’s another form of ROI to consider: EX initiatives often require employees to invest extra effort “for the greater good.” If they don’t see personal benefit — if their work gets harder — they will eventually revert to old habits, making EX gains temporary.
Webinar
On demand
Fuel Your Front Line: Workforce Trends Shaping 2026
Get expert insight into the tools and tactics top frontline teams will need in 2026.
Watch Now
Webinar
On demand
Fix the Disconnect Between Projects and Profit
Your margins are hiding in disconnected data. Let's find them.
Watch Now
Webinar
On demand
AI in Customer Service: Faster Resolutions, Happier Customers
Don’t let rising demand burn out your team. See how to build a smarter, more resilient support org.
Watch Now
Webinar
On demand
Accelerating Healthcare Ops with AI
Sign up to see how your peers are putting AI to work — and making it stick.
Watch Now
Webinar
On demand
From Nice-to-Have to Non-Negotiable: Prove the Value of Your EX Stack
Transform your tech stack: prove its value, secure your future.
Watch Now
Webinar
On demand
The Great Workforce Breakdown (And How to Stop It)
Disconnected employees. Failing communication. It’s time to turn things around.
Watch Now
The best ROI strategy is to use direct, initiative-level metrics and ensure that all stakeholders experience at least the same, if not reduced, effort.
6. The Centralization Problem
A common tenet of EX is it needs a centralized team to operate. They may collaborate with a network of influencers, but ultimately, the team is responsible for a massive number of touchpoints.
In reality, a small team can only meaningfully improve a handful of EX issues. After a year, they may have improved onboarding, implemented a new HR module and refreshed performance management. All good achievements — but barely a scratch on the full experience landscape.
A better approach is decentralization.
Employee interactions fall into four categories:
- Within the operational team
- Within project teams
- With internal business service providers
- With the company as a whole
Operational managers, project managers, internal service providers and top leadership are all experience drivers. With the right mindset, modern management practices and consistent digital support, you can empower all of them at scale, creating a decentralized, organization-wide EX engine.
7. Designed in Isolation
Every initiative improves something. But when improvements happen independently with different implementations across departments, employees experience a “patchwork” of interactions.
The experience becomes inconsistent and fragmented as employees move across tasks throughout the day.
This is why you need a clear vision of the overall employee experience you want to create across all four interaction categories. Without it, even well-intentioned improvements can work against each other.
A Better Alternative
If you’ve encountered any of these challenges, the good news is that there is a better approach, one that:
- Puts employees at the center.
- Addresses all relevant experience types.
- Treats digital as a core foundation rather than an afterthought.
This approach is built around the four categories of services that shape every employee’s day-to-day experience:
- Operational team management services — Delivered by team leaders to support employees in their core work.
- Project management services — Delivered by project managers within each project team, ensuring clarity, alignment and manageable workloads.
- Internal business services — Delivered by internal service providers (such as timesheets, expense reimbursements, HVAC, safety reporting) to help employees work efficiently.
- Leadership services — Delivered by the leadership team to all employees, shaping culture, direction and alignment.
Every role within the company can be understood as a unique combination of these four service types, directly influenced by all four experience drivers.
Modeling the employee experience in this way creates a powerful, comprehensive framework that:
- Improves employee experience quickly
- Generates tangible value for the organization
- Delivers strong, sustainable outcomes for the EX team
It is a scalable, holistic way to redesign how employees experience their work — and a far more effective alternative to traditional EX approaches.
Editor's Note: Catch up on other recommendations for improved employee experience below:
- Turn Team-Level Employee Experience Into a Performance Driver in 2026 — The old EX model is outdated. EX is now shaped in team meetings, workflows and daily decisions where speed results in progress or frustrating constraints.
- The New Playbook of Employee Experience — Organizations that treat engagement as an outcome of good design, not a program to fix, will build meaningful employee connections.
- A Comprehensive, Actionable Model for Employee Experience — A common approach to employee experience tells you to improve the "moments that matter." I suggest you should pay attention to the other 90% of employees' time.
Learn how you can join our contributor community.