Ivanti Originals

Employee Experience: The Missing Ingredient in Digital Transformation

• Ivanti

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Ivanti’s latest research report surveyed over 15,500 executives, security and IT professionals and office workers to reveal how undervaluing employee experience can hinder digital transformation efforts. 

Successful digital transformation requires a positive end-user experience, but most organizations still don’t prioritize digital employee experience (DEX) as a critical variable. Research finds that despite decades of investment in digital transformation, executive leaders and office workers are overwhelmed by their workplace tech tools. 

How can CIOs approach tech advancement in a way that combats complexity and prioritizes the end user experience? 

Listen to hear the full report: “Employee Experience: The Missing Ingredient in Digital Transformation”

To read the report visit ivanti.com/digital-transformation. 

For more Ivanti research on IT, security and the future of work, visit ivanti.com/research. 

About Ivanti 

Ivanti elevates and secures Everywhere Work so that people and organizations can thrive. We make technology work for people, not the other way around. Today’s employees use a wide range of corporate and personal devices to access IT applications and data over multiple networks to stay productive wherever and however they work. Ivanti is one of the only technology companies that finds, manages and protects each IT asset and endpoint in an organization. Over 40,000 customers, including 88 of the Fortune 100, have chosen Ivanti to help them deliver an excellent digital employee experience and improve IT and security team productivity and efficiency. At Ivanti, we strive to create an environment where all perspectives are heard, respected and valued, and we are committed to a more sustainable future for our customers, partners, employees and the planet. For more information, visit ivanti.com and follow @GoIvanti. 

Introduction:

 IT leaders are under intense pressure to deliver digital transformation. Ivanti’s research shows how companies can optimize transformation by prioritizing digital employee experience (DEX).  

You’re listening to the audio version of Employee Experience: The Missing Ingredient in Digital Transformation, part of Ivanti’s digital employee experience research series. To see more of Ivanti research, visit Ivanti, I-V-A-N-T-I.com/research.  

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Part one: Digital employee experience falls under the radar 

Successful digital transformation requires a positive end-user experience, but most organizations still don’t prioritize digital employee experience (DEX) as a critical variable. 

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When organizations refer to “digital transformation,” they are often referring to disruptions to both technical infrastructure and internal workflows — and these changes don’t just affect IT teams; they also affect employees. Managed well, digital transformation drives higher efficiency and productivity. Unfortunately, it can also be a source of stress for end users, who may feel overwhelmed by new technologies and processes.   

It stands to reason that measuring digital employee experience, or DEX, should be a critical part of digital transformation. DEX refers to the way employees interact with their organization’s digital environment — be it hardware, software, help-desk support or myriad other touchpoints.  

Managing DEX is a key effort because DEX influences so many aspects of work performance.   

In fact, nearly all, 97% of non-IT leaders agree that effectively managed DEX positively impacts employee productivity — whether through streamlined workflows, improved collaboration, reduced downtime or a host of other performance improvements. 

And yet … in a study of IT and security professionals, just 29% say improving DEX is a strategic priority for their team — far behind issues like optimizing costs or implementing AI and automation. 

Why the contradiction?   

Clearly, making IT operations more efficient is a major push for many organizations — for example, automating aspects of the service desk, or remotely monitoring application and device performance. These investments can also positively impact employee experience by reducing service-desk workloads and driving up employee productivity — all with the end goal of providing better service to end users.    

But Ivanti’s research shows companies are not taking an intentional approach to managing DEX; instead, they’re treating it as a happy byproduct of efficiency programs. In other words, if IT efficiencies lead to positive DEX, that’s a win. But most organizations are not specifically targeting DEX improvements.   

And because DEX isn’t intentionally measured or optimized, organizations miss out on big potential upsides of DEX management, including smoother adoption of new tools and workflows (in other words, less resistance to change), faster deployments of new applications and tools, and greater employee engagement.  

These benefits collectively lead to stronger business outcomes, such as sustainable operational efficiency, more productive employees and stronger return-on-tech-investment.   

[Sting]  

How can you take action? 

Here’s what Daren Goeson, Ivanti’s Senior Vice President of Product Management, has to say. 

“So, IT leaders really need to ensure that DEX is included intentionally in tech adoption and operational improvement decisions. And there's some best practices that you want to do. Number one, really understand your environment, understand all of your employees in the environment that they work. And are they working remotely? Are they contractors? Are they bringing their own device that gives you the framework in which you have a set of requirements in which you can look at technology adoption?  

Number two, measurement of digital experience is critical. So, make sure that the technology that you have and the technology that is being implemented can be monitored and provides the telemetry that you need to know how it's being used and how often it's being used. With that measurement, it allows you to take that data and focus on remediating or eliminating technology that's creating digital disruption within your environment, that's being a negative impact into your productivity.  

DEX is really something that needs to be part of your evaluation process as well. As you're bringing new technology into your environment, ensure that DEX plays a part in your evaluation process, and the end user focus is really part of that evaluation. 

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Part two: Tech complexity: a workplace hazard 

Despite decades of investment in digital transformation, knowledge workers say they feel overwhelmed by their workplace tech tools. 

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Ivanti’s research shows that office workers and organizational leaders alike feel stress and a lack of support when it comes to the technology they use at work. 

57% of office workers say they’re stressed by the number of tools they use, and 62% say they feel overwhelmed by the need to learn new technologies. 

These feelings are even more widespread among organizational leaders.   

The statistics are troubling on their own, but they also have wide-reaching implications for both individual productivity and the bottom line.   

End-user experience can be make-or-break for digital transformation initiatives. When employees feel stressed, frustrated or overwhelmed by their workplace tools, even the most promising new tech deployments can fail.   

AI implementations are the ultimate DEX testing ground. Companies are investing hundreds of millions in deploying AI and maximizing its value, but too often overlooking how DEX impacts that deployment. Knowledge workers are already burdened by tech complexity; the pressure to adopt new AI tools, often without appropriate guidelines or sufficient training, only exacerbates the burden.   

Additionally, most organizations are not adequately meeting their employees’ IT needs: Nearly 2 in 3 office workers say they feel unsupported when they have a tech problem at work, and 62% say they feel “overwhelmed” by the need to learn new tech at work. 

For organizations to truly embrace digital transformation, IT leaders must champion a cultural change within their organizations. This means providing on-demand, responsive IT support and delivering effective, dynamic tech training.  

No longer can technical improvements be the sole consideration in digital transformation. Companies must also weigh the impact of digital disruption on employees’ work lives and daily workflows. And just as importantly, organizations must support new digital initiatives with adequate service-desk support, education and training. 

[Sting]  

How can you take action? 

Here’s what Dave Shepherd, Ivanti’s Senior Vice President of Enterprise Sales for EMEA, has to say. 

“How we consider any deployment with AI, DEX has to be top of the list. So, when we deploy AI, if we don't get the user experience right with AI, it's not going to get us anywhere. In my mind, there's initially two parts. One is: how will the tool be used? Where are the efficiencies going to be gained? So, how does that help each and every employee do what they're doing today, but better, faster, quicker — and in some ways more educated because we're bringing AI into that?  

However, the flip of that, if we don't get the training of these tools right, then we find ourselves with challenges straight away. AI is brilliant, but AI has an assumption with it that every employee, every user will automatically be able to use it. But that's not the case. And I think a lot of the times we overlook the training within the tool.  

So, if we focus on DEX and bring it back to DEX or digital experience, a big part of that is understanding how the tool will be used, but also how are we going to educate each and every employee in the organization that's going to interact with it? How are we going to educate them to use the tool? And by combining those two approaches and putting DEX in the middle, you start to understand how AI will be a success in your organization.” 

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Part three: Empowering Everywhere Work 

Employees working remotely report their digital experience is inferior when working outside the office — a nonstarter for companies that care about employee engagement. 

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Employees want the option to work remotely or in a hybrid environment, yet those who do report that their tech experience out of the office doesn't always match their in-office experience. 

50% of employees today report challenges collaborating with work colleagues, and 43% of office workers say it’s not very easy for them to access all the same tools when working remotely.   

These findings are troubling considering that flexible work is now preferred and expected by many employees, and many companies have made significant operational changes to accommodate it.    

Everywhere Work is a mantra that applies not only to hybrid or remote workers, but to all employees who want the flexibility to work anywhere, anytime. Even full-time in-office employees often need to access their work remotely and securely — answering emails on the weekends, opening files from their smartphones, working while traveling or unexpectedly working from home due to unforeseen circumstances.  

Your employees want to be productive, efficient and engaged when working off-site. DEX has a major role to play here. As organizations continue to find ways to make hybrid and remote work more productive and sustainable, there are a number of things IT leaders should do.   

First, consider user experience when investing in new tools. Consistently measure digital employee experience to identify points of friction and frustration for remote/hybrid employees and optimize their experience.   

Second, provide more options for remote, on-demand training and support — including self-service knowledge bases and asynchronous learning.   

And finally, implement remote monitoring of endpoint and application performance and use automated remediation to address problems proactively. 

Proactive remediation is critical for the entire organization, but even more important for remote workers, who may have less day-to-day contact (and familiarity) with IT team members and be less likely to initiate a request. 

[Sting] 

How can you take action? 

Here’s what Corinna Fulton, Ivanti’s Vice President of Solutions Marketing, has to say. 

“Employees working outside of the office often report that they have a poor experience with the tools and technology that they are given to work with. And I think there's a number of things that can be done here. Organizations that invest in DEX tools have the ability to be deliberate in the way they measure the employees' experience. And one of the things that can be measured through DEX tools is the ability to access applications that they need or to be looking proactively for problems. So, if somebody is having consistent issues accessing a particular application, that might be a signal to IT and security leaders that there is a problem with access overall.  

By doing that, they can actually be more deliberate and proactive about the impact that tools and technology are having on remote or hybrid workers. Not only will they have a better overall management of the network of the devices, servers, data, etc., they're also going to have much more information about the employees, how the employees work and what they might fine tune or invest in to create a better experience for those employees that doesn't deprecate overall efficiency and security of the organization.” 

[Sting]   

Outro:

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 You can read the report and see the rest of Ivanti’s research at ivanti, I-V-A-N-T-I.com/research.   

You can follow Ivanti on social media at Go Ivanti, and you can visit us at ivanti.com to learn more about our products and solutions.   

   Thanks for listening!