How to Start Working Strategically with Your Employee Experience

Want to build an employee experience strategy that makes a real impact? Then it's time to rethink the foundation you're building on. Working strategically with your employee experience (EX) requires more than isolated initiatives or one-off surveys. It demands a strong, connected focus on four key EX cornerstones — each one critical to creating real, lasting impact.

Let’s break them down.

The 4 Cornerstones of a Successful Employee Experience Strategy

If you want to work with your employee experience on a strategic level, these four pillars are where you need to start: 

1. Create a Strategic Framework

2. Establish a Data-Driven Culture

3. Implement a New Way of Working

4. Transform the Employee Experience

All four interact and depend on each other — and together, they form the solid base your organization needs.

But don't worry!

You don’t have to address all areas at once. You can begin by strengthening one cornerstone at a time, as long as you keep the full picture in mind.

At the end of the day, all four must be owned, anchored, and facilitated by HR, with strong local ownership across the business to truly succeed.

1. Create a Strategic Framework

Building an employee-centered organization starts at the top. You need genuine buy-in from your executive board and senior management. Without their focus and commitment, employee experience risks becoming just another "nice-to-have".

That means:

• Establishing a clear, inspiring EX vision.

• Tying EX directly to financial and business outcomes.

• Launching a formal EX program with concrete initiatives.
  
  

Research shows that organizations excelling in these areas are significantly more likely to report improvements in employee experience over time.

2. Establish a Data-Driven Culture

The foundation of any serious EX strategy is simple: Data. Insight. Action.

This means gathering ongoing feedback across the employee journey — not with an overwhelming flood of surveys, but with smart, continuous listening. Analyzing the right data at the right time empowers your organization to move quickly and create meaningful change.

Our research shows that organizations mastering continuous listening and agile action have made far greater strides in employee experience than those who haven't.

3. Implement a New Way of Working

Taking your employee experience to the next level requires a shift in mindset. HR teams, leaders, and managers need to design experiences through the employees' eyes — not just manage processes.

This involves working with:

• Employee journey mapping.

• Design thinking workshops.

• Experience design sprints.
  
  

These methods help you uncover pain points, rethink key touchpoints, and co-create solutions together with employees — not just for them.

Despite the proven value of these methods, few organizations have systematically mapped and redesigned their employee journeys yet. That's a huge opportunity for those ready to lead the way.

4. Transform the Employee Experience

True EX success requires real transformation across the organization. This means:

• Mobilizing not just HR, but leaders, teams, and employees.

• Embedding EX thinking into daily leadership practices.

• Continuously educating and empowering everyone involved.

Organizations that achieve this level of mobilization consistently show stronger improvements in engagement, wellbeing, and performance.

Master this cornerstone, and you’re well on your way to delivering a truly standout employee experience.

How You Can Take the First Step Today

Feeling overwhelmed? Don't be! You don't have to reinvent everything at once.

Start by asking these questions:

• Is EX clearly tied to financial KPIs in your organization?

• Are you gathering continuous, intelligent insights across the employee journey?

• Are your employee initiatives rooted in true experience design methods?

• Is there real organizational ownership of EX at every level?
  
  

If you're unsure about even one of these, you’re already facing an opportunity to level up.

And if you want to dive deeper and work with your EX strategy, you can download the full guide on how to build the four cornerstones into your EX approach right here.

...We promise, your future workforce will thank you.