HR Tech launches Employee Experience Overview 2023, the most comprehensive study on Employee Experience carried out in Latin America

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Pin People, an HR Tech that combines software and professional services to help companies manage their Employee Experience, has just launched their annual study: Panorama da Experiência do Colaborador 2023 (or “2023 Employee Experience Overview”), a comprehensive report about the state of the employee experience within organizations in Latin America. This study, conducted by the startup’s People Science and Data Science teams utilizing their proprietary artificial intelligence technology, sheds light on the true needs of employees throughout their journey within the company. “In our study, we analyzed the following segments: gender, generation, length of service, and role seniority. In all of them, we observed significant differences in experience, especially when we look at gender and generation,” explains Luisa Aliboni, People Science Coordinator at Pin People and the study’s lead. The report surveyed over 390,000 employees from Brazil and Latin America, with 51.4% identifying as women and 48.6% as men, while 29.4% of respondents had leadership roles. Regarding generations, 1.8% were Baby Boomers, 14% Generation X, 60.3% Generation Y, and 23.9% Generation Z. Concerning length of service, 20.7% had 0 to 6 months, 27.5% between 6 months and 2 years, 32.6% between 2 and 4 years, and 19.2% had more than 4 years in the company. Organizations have been noticing that the experience of their employees is what matters most. Such concern for experience is reflected in a growing attention to mental health, psychological safety, happiness and well-being at work, the promotion of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in organizations, as well as the strengthening of the Employee Experience policies. As a result, it is necessary to take actions at every point of contact between employees and organizations. To achieve such goal, the actions can be based on the pillars of EX (Employee Experience): Involvement, people and support.

The data analysis reveals aspects that require attention from organizations, which can be divided into six Employee Experience pillars: 

Employee Experience beyond the first day

Throughout the employee journey, the experience tends to deteriorate and the gap between the employer brand and the employee value proposition becomes more evident. This means that what the organization is advertising during recruitment differs from what it offers on a daily basis. This fact is reflected in the eNPS (employee Net Promoter Score) results along the employee lifecycle, which presents a downward trend, with the eNPS average being +83 in the first week and +46 when the employee leaves. Further analysis of these numbers reveals that the biggest sources of dissatisfaction are related to recognition, growth, and development within the company. Therefore, the observed trend in 2022 was the need to strengthen the culture towards continuous development and recognition throughout the employee journey. “Strengthening and diversifying development tools and methods, as well as recognition, is already a reality in some companies and a goal in others,” explains Frederico Lacerda, CEO and co-founder of Pin People.

Plural Organizations

It is already known in the corporate world that diverse companies are able to be more creative, generate better results, and make better decisions. That is why they need to focus on having a more diverse workforce, consisting of people with different ages, social classes, beliefs, and also belonging to minority groups. However, the work cannot stop there. In addition to investing in diversity, organizations need to focus on equity and inclusion, understanding that different realities require different needs. “To improve this point, we need to stop thinking that ‘one size fits all’ and start building different experiences for different groups of people, promoting the confrontation of structural inequalities, and being alert to the challenges that a multigenerational workforce demands,” suggests Frederico.

Redesigning a Flexible Organization

To ensure that we can provide personalized experiences for different groups of employees, we need to ensure that flexibility becomes part of the company’s policies. Overall, employees are satisfied with the level of flexibility in the company, except for Generation X, which seems to be more dissatisfied with various aspects of the journey. The favorability index regarding this issue corresponds to: Baby Boomers (92%), Generation X (36%), Generation Y (92%), and Generation Z (87%). “Our suggestion at this point is precisely the reevaluation of processes, strategies, objectives, rituals, etc., with a focus on flexibility,” reveals Luisa.”

Proactivity towards well-being

The study revealed a great dissatisfaction with the lack of balance between personal and professional life, with mental health being one of the topics with the highest number of negative comments attached. Among the comments, employees reported feeling anxious, drained of energy, pressured, tired, and discouraged. In addition, they indicated psychological safety as a topic that needs to be improved in companies and has a high correlation with the expectation of staying with the company: the better the evaluation on the topic, the longer employees intend to stay in the company. Among the other topics that are related to a high expectation of staying in the company, we also find: meaning, purpose, inclusion, and team support, which are closely linked to Martin Seligman’s Happiness methodology proposed. “Therefore, we reinforce the need to strengthen the culture centered on Psychological Safety and greater tolerance for mistakes, in better balancing the workload of employees and in deepening Corporate Happiness practices,” indicates Frederico Lacerda.

Offboarding Support

When analyzing Offboarding eNPS scores, we’ve noticed that since 2020, they’ve been consistently the lowest in the journey, with significant variations between voluntary (+48) and involuntary (+41) terminations. Upon delving into the reasons for these lower scores, we found that, among voluntary terminations, the topics with the highest dissatisfaction are Total Remuneration, with a 41% favorability rate, followed by Work-Life Balance, with 46%, and Team Feedback, with 50%. However, when we look at the discomfort of people who were involuntarily dismissed, the scenario is quite different. The three topics with the lowest favorability index are directly linked to their relationship with their leaders, namely: Leadership Feedback, with a 18% favorability rate, Coherent Leadership, with 22%, and Leadership Support, with 50%. There is also an important result to be highlighted, which is the fact that the female audience evaluate the Respectful Dismissal topics with much more dissatisfaction, presenting a 48% favorability rate compared to 78% for the male respondents. “In this pillar, we see that there is still a lot of work to be done. In addition to understanding what is causing this experience gap among female employees regarding the offboarding process, we also need to look at the development of leadership, so that they increase the quantity and quality of their feedback and alignment, giving clarity to employees about what is expected of them before this results in a dismissal,” says Luisa. 

Leadership Support and Development

The evaluation of lNPS (Leadership Net Promoter Score) indicates that, in general, people are satisfied with their leadership. However, when looking at gender and job level, it becomes clear that this result is not homogeneous. While women indicated a score 10 points lower than men (+68) in this regard, people in leadership positions also indicated a score 14 points lower than people without leadership positions (+65). This indicates that there is a gap in women’s experience with their leadership, but also the study found out that the experience of leadership is being negatively impacted by the relationship with their own direct leadership. Based on the importance of the leadership role in promoting better experiences for employees, we reinforce the need for training and support for leadership at various levels of the organizational hierarchy. “Leadership needs to be better developed to understand their role in Employee Experience and deliver better experiences for teams, while organizations need to understand that leadership should also have positive and personalized experiences to be able to effectively fulfill their role,” concludes the co-founder of Pin People.

The procedures adopted to integrate a new employee may vary from company to company, but to ensure a successful process, it is essential for the company to work on 5 levels: Organizational Processes, Connections, Culture, Role Clarity, and Impact.