Whether employees are working remotely, in the office, or hybrid setup, IT services must be optimised to provide consistent performance, stability and reliability. Maintaining an efficient end-user experience is critical for business success.
This raises the question, what is end user experience?
In short, end-user experience in IT refers to how people interact and perceive technology that’s provided to them. It’s about how well their devices perform, how smoothly their apps run, and how easy it is to get work done.
Are their tools fast and reliable, or slow, frustrating, and full of glitches? A great end-user experience means your employees can work efficiently without tech getting in the way.
Unfortunately, organisations can struggle to gain full visibility into how their IT estate affects end users.
We’ll explore why end-user experience is important, how it directly impacts business success, and strategies to ensure your employees have a great digital experience at work below.
Why End User Experience Is Important
Before we get into how to improve end user experience, we’ll explain why end user experience is important for business success.
Improved Productivity
A smooth and efficient end-user experience plays a crucial role in driving productivity. Dealing with constant digital issues in a tech-heavy workplace can slow employees down.
A study by Chelsea Apps Factory reveals that poor IT systems at work result in an average loss of 22 minutes of productivity daily. Over time, this amounts to a full day of work lost each month, or 7.5 million lost workdays every week across the entire UK workforce.
Productivity improves when systems, apps, and digital tools are fast, simple, and easy to use. Employees spend less time troubleshooting complicated interfaces, and more time focusing on their actual work, which leads to improved overall efficiency.
Employee Satisfaction
If user experience is lacking, it can lead to frustration, causing employees to look for better alternatives. Research from YaYa shows that 50% of employees would leave their current roles if they have negative experiences with digital tools that they rely on.
Focusing on providing a seamless and enjoyable user experience helps companies strengthen loyalty and keep employees engaged, creating lasting relationships in the process.
Enhanced Financial Performance
Organisations that focus on improving end-user experience stand to gain in employee satisfaction and financial performance.
According to IBM, companies that rank in the top 25% for employee experience see nearly three times the return on assets and double the return on sales compared to those in the bottom quartile.
Creating a positive, seamless user experience helps companies create a productive workforce, which leads to better overall results. With reduced operational friction and higher employee engagement, organisations can improve profitability, growth, and long-term success.
Improving End User Experience Strategies
Improving end user experience is a key factor to achieve business success. But where should you begin?
Here are some key strategies that can help increase business performance and improve the end-user experience.
1. Prioritise Listening To Users
One of the most effective ways of improving end user experience is to truly listen to employees. Collecting feedback, understanding pain points, and acting on this information can help improve interactions with digital workplace tools.
Common challenges that employees face can include confusion about which tools to use, difficulty adjusting to new applications, and frustrations over security considerations or complex interfaces. Addressing these issues through feedback can help IT teams meet user needs and improve their digital work environment.
2. Simplify Onboarding
A major barrier to successful tool adoption is the learning curve associated with new software. A seamless onboarding process helps employees get up to speed and begin using tools efficiently.
Automatically enrolling new hires in onboarding can reduce troubleshooting time and increase confidence in using technology. Hands-on training allows employees to try the tool in a low-pressure environment, learning by doing.
Additionally, ensuring ongoing support by making resources such as FAQs easily accessible helps employees continue learning and troubleshooting as they become more familiar with tools.
Simplifying onboarding means employees can begin using new tools faster, reducing frustration and speeding up adoption.
3. Leverage End User Monitoring Tools
Organisations should consider integrating end user observability tools to optimise the end-user experience. These tools can provide insights into how employees interact with digital systems, identifying performance issues, potential bottlenecks, and areas for improvement.
Monitoring the user journey allows IT teams to proactively address issues before they affect productivity, maintaining a seamless experience for employees.
End user monitoring tools, like our End User Observability service, allow organisations to:
- Understand digital performance: Get insights into how users’ digital performance is affected in a flexible work environment, helping you spot and fix issues before they become problems.
- Reduce resolution time: Automate the fix for common user issues to speed up resolution times and ease the burden on the IT service desk.
- Track end-user experience: Monitor end-user experience to see how internal initiatives are working, and compare it against industry benchmarks.
- Minimise productivity loss: Measure IT changes objectively and prevent any productivity loss for end users.
- Validate IT changes: Check the impact of regular IT changes on user experience, application performance, and device stability to ensure everything runs smoothly.
4. Measure Success With The Right Metrics
To truly understand the impact of end-user experience efforts, businesses should measure more than just working time or system performance.
The true measures of success lie in how these tools affect employee engagement, productivity, and general satisfaction.
Consider these metrics when measuring the effectiveness of end-user experience initiatives:
- Productivity Gains: Has productivity improved since the introduction of new tools? This can be tracked by measuring output, task completion times, and overall efficiency.
- Adoption Rates: Are employees regularly using the tools provided? A high adoption rate indicates the tools are effective and well-received by users.
- Employee Engagement: Conduct regular surveys to gauge how employees feel about the tools and systems they use.
- Time-to-Value: The quicker employees master new tools and applications, the faster they can begin delivering value to the business.
- Training Effectiveness: Assess how well employees retain training and apply it to their tasks. This reflects how effectively tools and training are boosting productivity.
How Can We Help
We hope that this post on how to improve end user experience has given you insight into optimising your organisation’s workflow.
At Net Consulting, our Digital Experience Management Solutions are designed to help you create a productive digital workplace. Whether you’re looking to improve end-user experience, monitor network performance, or improve tool adoption, our DEM solutions have got you covered.
Call us on +44 (0)292 097 2020 to discuss your needs in more detail.
