• Gathiuru urged employers to understand their workforce's likes, dislikes, what gives them joy or pain at work and take necessary corrective measures.
• The report points out disparity of how work is viewed by Generation Z, Millennials, X and baby boomers.
A survey carried out by the Institute of Customer Experience-Kenya shows a majority of employees are not happy in their workplaces.
The State of Employee Experience (EX) for Customer Experience (CX) Success survey, carried out between March and April 2024, shows the employees net promoter score-a metric that measures employees loyalty and engagement to an organisation-is at 23 per cent.
“Twenty-three per cent is not good enough. We need to move higher than that. The reports show 30 per cent of employees are not too happy, while 24 per cent find their work places not the place to be,” said Carolyne Gathuru, ICX board director in Mombasa during the 5th Annual Africa Customer Experience Conference.
The survey respondents were from government and private sectors including finance, telco, transport, manufacturing, healthcare, energy, agriculture, technology and education.
The survey also revealed misalignment between EX and CX and quiet quitting, with more than 50 per cent of employees not actively engaged at work, indicating a need for improved engagement strategies.
The launch of the survey aligns with the government’s strategic objectives as outlined in the strategic plans of various Ministries, Departments and Agencies.
“The understanding of the current state of employee experience and its implications for customer satisfaction, decision-makers can prioritise interventions to enhance public service delivery and organisational performance,” Gathuru said.
“What has come out of this report is so fundamental to any organisation not only in the country but the entire continent because we know when Kenya does something, the rest of the region follows.”
She urged employers to understand their workforce likes, dislikes, what gives them joy or pain at work and take necessary corrective measures.
“When we have happy employees, business will flourish. If the business sector is working, then the entire nation will work. We need a robust business environment that comes from the people that work in the businesses,” Gathuru said.
The report points out disparity of how work is viewed by generation Z, Millennial, X and baby boomers.
Gathuru said there is a need to align human resource management and internal customers’ policies to a younger workforce.
The survey shows data and technology is key and need to be used in a way that speaks to a morphing and a dynamic strategy.
ICX director of customer metrics Akshay Shah said organisations need to focus on making their employees happy as organisations traditionally have been putting a lot of efforts in the customers’ space, but there is a misalignment.
He challenged organisations to put more efforts, initiatives and money to improve employees’ experiences.
“Get the culture within the organisations right coupled with aspirational leadership because without the right culture and leadership employees and customer experiences will fail,” Shah said.
He said the survey shows some employees do not have emotional attachment to the organisations they are working in.
“They will come to work but mentally they have checked out. They actually are not performing and this has a big impact on the performance of the company because if employees are disgruntled. They also affect the motivation of other employees in the organisation, thus bring productivity down,” Shah said.
Unilever Kenya managing director Luck Ochieng said employees are the bedrock of company’s success and if they have better experience, it will drive performance.
ICX chairman Joseph Choge said the conference brought together business leaders, chief executives and a host of customer experience professionals and practitioners at senior and mid-level management.
The theme of the conference is ‘Elevating Employee Experience for Customer Experience Success’.
Choge said the event was insightful and participants exchanged best practices.
“We encourage all organisations in the country and beyond to look at the experiences of their employees because without a happy employee, then there is no happy customer,” he said.