How to improve internal communication on the frontline: 10 tips to win

Employee retention is the art of holding onto your staff once you’ve hired them.

And, in 202w, it’s more important than ever.

Why?

Because companies are finally waking up to the competitive advantages of being a "people" company. A "churn and burn" approach to hiring results in poor customer service.

This is an issue, because customers are placing increasing value on good service. With smartphones, it’s easier than ever to find a competitor company to buy from. Or in the case of consumer goods, to avoid the shop altogether and order online.

Before we start.

You can hold onto employees (more or less) by treating them well. Listening to their concerns, and providing them with a few incentives to stay put.

If you’re an HR professional or a CEO, you don’t need us to tell you that.
What you might find useful is an in-depth guide to employee retention in the modern workforce.

How to maximize your employee engagement efforts. And make sure there were no stones left unturned in creating the most comprehensive guide... we asked some industry-leading experts to contribute.
We’ll cover:

• Detail on the importance of employee retention today.
• How to build effective employee retention strategies.
• The exit interview, and how to turn it into your secret employee retention weapon.

Let’s begin...

Why is employee retention important?

Employee retention means "treating your employees right"; it’s an end in itself, not just the means.

From an ethical standpoint, no company should mistreat their employees. Meeting your colleagues’ basic needs and providing them with a safe and stimulating workplace? It's the right thing to do for its own sake.

But it’s more than that.

Attracting talent to your company—and keeping it once you’ve found it—has so many advantages. According to Herzberg's famous Two-Factory Theory, employee retention and employee motivation are interdependent. You can find out more about this in the Vantage Circle HR blog. A strong employee retention strategy will:

• Reduce operating costs.
• Improve customer service levels.
• Allow you to out-compete your competitors for the best people.

The cost of high employee turnover

Hiring and firing is expensive.

Eye-wateringly expensive, to be precise. Think six to nine months salary as a conservative estimate.

Then you need to consider the impact of not having someone there to do that person’s work. That could slow down a massive project. Cause higher overtime costs as existing staff pick up their work. Or just lead to a reduction in staff morale as they struggle with increased workloads.

Companies tend to get the importance of this for salaried positions and execs. but there’s often a bit of a blind spot when it comes to their non-desk workforce and the real cost of losing an employee.

Sure, replacing a senior-level manager is more expensive than replacing a bus driver. But what happens if your bus drivers’ morale becomes so low that two or three quit per month?

It all adds up.

"Losing talented staff can also have emotional consequences on those who stay. Effectively reducing productivity by decreasing morality and motivation," says Rochelle van Rensburg of the Ezzely Blog.

"Maintaining essential talent is therefore mission-critical to organizational effectiveness for all these reasons. Staff retention puts companies ahead of their competitors, by reducing recruiting and re-skilling costs. But more importantly, by keeping the top performers, which results in all of their specialized knowledge and expertise remaining in-house."

Your mobile workforce interacts most with customers. They are the public face of your company. So, their happiness will reflect in the level of service they give your customers.

Happier, more engaged employees deliver better customer service. They also build up a bank of operational knowledge over time. This helps them respond to queries quicker and more effectively than a steady stream of new hires ever could.

The importance of employee retention in 2020

An active employee retention strategy is more important than ever.
There are two key reasons for this:

Firstly, it's never been easier for customers to look elsewhere if they feel that your levels of service don’t match their expectations. We live in an age where any information you want is available via a few taps of a smartphone screen.

Dissatisfied with a hotel stay? Booking.com can recommend thousands of others.

Bad experience in a taxi? A quick Google gets you all the phone numbers of other local firms.

Poor customer experience at a theme park? TripAdvisor lists other attractions.

You get the idea.

Despite this, customers still want to be loyal. Millennials want to stick around if your brand fits in with their personal values. Don’t throw away this loyal market.

Secondly, it's never been easier to browse jobs via online jobs boards. If your workforce isn’t happy they will move. Don’t assume that they will sit in their job miserable because there aren’t any other options.

Reasons why employees leave and reasons why managers leave aren't always the same.

Your competitors may be waking up to the benefits of being a "people company." They'll more than happily snap up the staff you can't keep.

The best employee retention strategies

A strong employee retention rate is crucial to remain competitive. How you go about doing this is worth examining in some depth.

Remember - you are an employee too! As you create your employee retention strategies, keep asking yourself, "would I be happy with this?" or, "does this seem reasonable to me?"

Here are a few points you’ll need to cover when creating an employee engagement plan. Remember, the employee experience starts before the first day at the interviewing stage. To set each new starter up for success, getting the onboarding right is crucial. Want to learn more? Check out the Definitive Guide to Onboarding.

Let's quickly touch on the foundation of any working relationship: trust. As Kayla Lopez from the recruitment firm Viqtory.com reminds us. "If your employees trust you and the organization they tend to embrace the workplace; this begins before the employee is even hired. Transparency is something that we need to willingly support to gain trust. A workforce that trusts you will be engaged, a workforce that is engaged will retain. Trust is the foundation of all strong partnerships."

Now for the details...

Pay well

We’ll start with the basics.

If your pay rates don’t match with your competitors’, you’re going to have a bad time keeping hold of your high achievers.

Take a quick look at what your competitors pay for equal positions. Try and build a league table of what similar companies to you pay, and where you rank. Glassdoor is a good starting point.

Aiming for the absolute top is ideal if you can afford it, but you don’t have to offer the best salary offer out there. There are plenty of other ways to encourage your staff to stay put (more on that below), as long as you can land in the middle of the table. For someone working in a frontline job, it is difficult to give your best at work knowing you could get $5.00 per hour more for the same job elsewhere. (Even if there’s free pizza every Friday).

It’s also worth noting that even a generous wage packet won’t persuade your employees to stay if you’re otherwise a nightmare to work for.
Consider this step the cornerstone of all your employee engagement efforts. Not enough by itself, but essential in building something lasting and meaningful.

Give competitive benefits

You might not be able to take it to Silicon Valley levels. (Free three-course meals for breakfast, lunch and dinner, unlimited holidays, and puppy creches).

You can offer a benefits package or a performance bonus scheme tailored to the size of your business, your budget, and your business objectives. The key is to prioritize benefits that would have a tangible difference to the lives of your employees. Add the fancy stuff on if you have money to spare.

Think about:

• Childcare vouchers: we’re all aware of the struggle to find affordable childcare. Help your workforce with their work-life balance (and keep it diverse—most of the people who end up quitting jobs for childcare reasons tend to be women) by offering vouchers to help with the cost.

• Health cover for employees and dependents: an absolute must if you're US-based, although even if you live in a country which has some form of universal health care, giving employees the opportunity to go private is very appealing.

• Flexible working: if the type of work you do accommodates it, flexible working is like gold dust to your staff. A "work your hours however you want" policy helps people manage childcare commitments, fit in dentist appointments, and reduce the stress of trying to juggle work and life commitments.

• Lunch program: Most of the lunch break is spent buying, prepping or reheating food. Offering a tasty and healthy in-house solution, such as the online canteen Smunch, allows your employees to capitalize on their break time and share a meal together. Ultimately, this will improve your company culture and cross-departmental communication as well.

Once you’ve got the basics sorted, some nice-to-have options include:

• Above average PTO allowances
• Free gym memberships and cycle to work programs
• Personal development funds

Develop a feedback culture to empower employees

Your employees know their workplace better than anyone else. Make the most of it.

If your employees feel involved in shaping their workplace and consulted on major decisions then they will be reluctant to leave it.

The key to this is to carry regular, easy-to-complete employee engagement surveys so you know exactly what the mood on the ground is and how to improve it.

Employees will hold an enormous amount of goodwill towards a workplace that listens to their concerns and acts on them. Equally, they will reserve a special sort of resentment for those that send out survey after survey, only to ignore the results.

It’s essential to have a solid plan in place for your employee engagement surveys, or they will backfire spectacularly.

Key pointers

• Small, regular surveys are better than long, annual ones. Only giving your employees one chance per year to raise issues will result in bottled up frustrations spewing out come survey time. Not only does this result in surveys that skew unhelpfully negative, but it also means that your HR team will face an uphill struggle
• Another point about designing surveys that you can respond to effectively: keep it targeted. Focus each of your quick-answer surveys on a specific area—facilities onsite, for example, or about relationships with line managers.
• Use short answer questions: "yes/no" or "on a scale of 1-5" formats make it easier for people to respond immediately. Long-form feedback can be helpful, but having lots of long-answer text boxes on your survey will put people off completing it. A good compromise is to have an optional "any specific comments" box at the end of the survey.

When you’ve processed the surveys, share the results and shout about what you’re doing to act on feedback. Employees will appreciate the transparency, and it’s important to signpost what you’re doing to address the concerns they raise—or they won’t bother to participate in future surveys.

Try and create a "feedback culture" in your company by encouraging people to come forward with suggestions for improvements any time they want. Surveys highlight pain points as they are reactive; an anonymous suggestions box (either digital or real-life), on the other hand, will bring out the more innovative side of your workforce.

These suggestions might be small—a new way of organizing the break room fridge, or the introduction of free coffee Mondays—but the opportunity to improve the workplace in this way will work wonders for your wider staff’s sense of allegiance to it.

Make your workplace a fun place to work

If your coworkers are your friends, spending time at work doesn’t seem so taxing.

This is where the fun stuff comes in—the away days, lunchtime yoga, the free breakfast bar, the Christmas party...

If you have a mobile workforce, don’t forget to include them, too! They might not be in the office that often, so having regular get-togethers or breakfast clubs when shifts change is a great way to build a sense of belonging.

Obviously, base these activities on what your own workforce would like, but some ideas include:

• Regular lunchtime sports clubs (running, yoga, five-a-side, badminton are good starting points)
• Away days and team-building weekends.
• Semi-regular opportunities for free food. Depending on the size of your team, you could offer lunch on the company each Friday, pizza parties when teams hit their targets or just because
• Big events like Christmas parties and family fun days. If you run awareness weeks for things like diversity, mental health and stress, why not run some exciting events for these too?
• Recognition of key milestones. If there are particularly busy periods throughout the year (like the Christmas rush for anyone working in retail or hospitality), put on an event to recognize the hard work your employees put in. This could be a full-on party, or simply just giving your staff the nod to take off after lunch on a quiet day.

This step does, however, come with a big flashing warning sign that says: don’t bother doing any of these without doing the steps listed above first.

Because these are fun and exciting, and sound super trendy when you put them on your Careers page, people often use them in place of paying a decent wage, or offering flexible working hours, or acting on employee feedback.

The exit interview - your employee retention secret weapon

One of the best ways of figuring out what’s going wrong with your employee retention efforts is asking your colleagues when they leave.

Seems counter-intuitive, and rather frustrating, doesn’t it?

And in some ways, it is. No amount of collecting and aggregating exit interview data, tweaking your employee engagement plan and making changes in your company to reduce employee turnover will change the fact that, for that particular employee, your efforts weren’t enough. For HR people and line managers, that stings sometimes.

Still, if you can take your losses on the chin, this is a real opportunity to do better for your colleagues, and identify and fix any major issues that push people to leave.

There are three main reasons why exit interviews are so effective at flagging up things that need to change:

The employee is leaving so won't hold back

Regardless of how many times you reassure your colleagues that your pulse surveys are anonymous and that helpful suggestions are encouraged, they will still be a little suspicious.

The worry that surveys aren’t really anonymous, or that speaking out about a key workplace bugbear will get them labelled as a troublemaker, will be a constant thorn in the side of your employee retention efforts.

(As a side note, if this attitude is pervasive then it might be time to take a look at your workplace culture. A little reticence is natural. An all-encompassing dread of speaking up might indicate something a little more sinister).

The exit interview is a different kettle of fish. They’re leaving. There are no raises or opportunities for promotion in the pipeline. This is their opportunity to "tell it like it really is."

Listen, even if you think they’re being unfair and bitter.

Problems brought up during exit interviews tend to have weighed heavily on an employee’s decision to leave. In other words, they’re big issues you need to address urgently.

Get the whole picture

Multiple exit interviews help build up a better picture of life on the ground.

Of course, there’s always the chance that one particular employee just, for whatever reason, didn’t have a good time.

That’s where keeping data from previous exit interviews comes in.

For example, if an employee complains about their line manager being unbearable, it might just be a clash of personalities. Equally it could be because that line manager is difficult to work for and too demanding. It’s difficult to say without further info.

So. Run some analytics.

How many other employees from that line manager’s team have left over the past year?

Did they say anything in their exit interviews?

Have they been flagged to HR for anything previously?

If so, you might want to investigate further.

This is why it’s important to conduct an exit interview for every single person that leaves the business. If you restrict it to management positions, people based in HQ, or full-time workers, you’re missing key sets of data that could be useful in improving your employee retention strategy.

Find out what went wrong

An exit interview, conducted well, helps you identify wrong turns in your employee journey map.

You’ll probably have some sort of employee journey map already.

You might call it something different. We’re referring to the plan you make that starts at the hire phase and ends with the offboarding phase when the employee leaves. This normally includes guidelines for each stage they go through with your company. For example:

Hiring:

• Offer letter and contract sent
• Start date agreed two weeks in advance

Onboarding:

• First day: tour of premises, fire safety, welcome coffee or lunch
• First six weeks: all e-learning to be completed

You get the idea. Here's a basic template you could expand on:

(Source: Trends in Employee Journey Maps)

The exit interview provides an excellent opportunity to ask your employees about various stages in this plan, to see whether they’ve been carried out to your expectations.

Ask specifically, and don’t be afraid to go right back to the start of their employment. Whether they felt welcomed in their first weeks, for example. If they were given clear and regular feedback on their performance, and compare that to your notes on how your employee journey should pan out.

It could be that, despite your meticulous efforts in planning it, your employee journey map isn’t being adhered to by managers in the wider organisation. This could be why your employees are leaving - this map provides guidelines on how to make sure people feel safe, supported and included at work. If people don’t follow it you’re going to have problems.

Your employee journey map is important. If it isn’t being followed, you need to correct that as soon as you can. Exit interviews are the best way to do this.

How to conduct an employee retention interview

Be flexible around your employees needs

If a lot of your workforce are remote or mobile, don’t insist on a face-to-face interview at HQ.

There are several free video calling apps available, so why not make use of them? An employee is more likely to feel comfortable talking to you if you’ve made accommodations for their situation.

If they’re more comfortable talking to you, they’re more likely to be honest with you, and that’s exactly what you want.

Don’t make it overly formal

Go for a relaxed vibe. Making things too formal will only stifle conversation.

If you’re conducting a face-to-face interview, it’s a nice touch to provide some sort of refreshments; hot drinks and a pastry, maybe. The employee will appreciate the gesture, and it will encourage a more conversational feel, which is exactly what will get them to open up.

Identify the specifics to touch on

You will know, from previous exit interviews if there are any particular pain points in your employee experience.

Ask about them. You’ll then be able to establish:

• Whether these are still issues
• What progress you’ve made on them, and how effective your efforts to tackle them have been.

...But allow them to express their opinion too

If the structure of the interview is entirely created by you, you could miss something important.

By allowing employees space to expand on their own concerns, you give yourself the opportunity to pick up on potential issues that aren’t on your radar. Sure, a lot of this could be specific to that particular individual, but you should investigate nonetheless—otherwise you’ll never know whether it’s the iceberg tip of something bigger.

Remember: your relationship with the employee isn't over

People leave for all sorts of reasons—not all of them negative.

You might want to leave the door open for talented employees, in case they want to return at some point. Also consider that talented former employees can be great source of referrals.

These can be your company’s cheerleaders, even after they’ve left. A good exit interview can make this relationship. A poor one can ruin it.

Of course, there’s also the possibility that the employee leaving has been less than stellar. In this case you should see the exit interview as a chance to smooth things over, and divert potentially negative Glassdoor reviews or social media mentions.

Final thoughts

To summarize:

• An employee retention strategy is important because it makes your employees happier. Happier, more engaged employees perform better in general, and deliver better customer service.
• The cost of employee turnover is measured in increased operational costs and decreased institutional knowledge.

Bearing this in mind, the question you should be asking yourself isn’t "can we afford to expand our employee retention efforts?"

It’s "can we afford not to?"

An engaged, happy workforce with a low churn rate isn’t just a nice thing to have.

It’s not just something you can boast about on your Careers page.

It’s a competitive advantage—and people are only just waking up to this fact. Because now more than ever, people value good customer service. If you can provide that, you’ll have a serious head start on your competitors.

Blink is an internal communications tool that’s does everything your intranet does, but better. Try it out today! Request a free demo to get started.

Since joining Blink’s London office less than a year ago, our Data Analyst, Nikita, has already made her mark — tackling data-driven projects, collaborating across teams, and fueling the mission to empower frontline workers. She loves the energy of a smaller startup and finds real purpose in crafting tech solutions that make a positive impact.

Read on to learn how Nikita dove into the world of advanced analytics at Blink, why she’s proud of her work on the AEI tool, and what keeps her excited about the future!

What initially attracted you to join Blink?

I was really inspired by Blink’s mission to empower frontline workers. It was great to see technology being used for such a positive cause. I’ve worked at startups before and really enjoy the energy of a smaller company. Before joining Blink, I was at a slightly bigger startup, but I love our size and find what we’re doing here incredibly exciting.

What's a project you are proud of from your time at Blink?

AEI! I’m particularly proud of the Advanced Employee Intelligence (AEI) tool. I’ve been working on it with Izzy for the past few months, and it’s been exciting to provide customers with insights they didn’t have before. This tool offers actionable metrics, and it’s gratifying to see how our data can truly help other organizations.

How would you describe the company culture at Blink in three words?

I would say supportive, vibrant and energetic.

What's one thing you're excited about for the future of Blink?

I’m really excited about the coming year at Blink. We have a lot of great new customers on board, which means there will be even more data to explore. I can’t wait to see the insights we uncover and how they’ll help us continue innovating.

Can you tell us about a recent initiative or program launched at Blink that you found particularly exciting?

I found the recent Frontline Heroes holiday campaign especially meaningful. It highlighted real stories from frontline workers who use Blink every day, and hearing their experiences was incredibly heartwarming. It served as a powerful reminder of the impact Blink can have on people’s daily lives, and it gave me a renewed sense of purpose in supporting our users on the frontlines.

Why do you work for Blink?

I’m early in my career, and one of the biggest benefits of working at a smaller company like Blink is getting exposure to so many different areas — Marketing, Customer Success, Product — you name it. I love the variety and the fact that I can see the direct impact of my work. Plus, Blink’s mission really resonates with me, so it feels great to contribute to something I believe in every day.

I started here as an Operations Support Analyst under Ana (Mason), which was a fantastic learning experience. But as I took on more analytical tasks, especially around the development of AEI, I transitioned into my current role in Data RevOps. I’m finding it incredibly interesting, and being hands on with such an important product is really rewarding.

Given how much I’ve already learned and how the company is evolving, I see myself staying at Blink for the foreseeable future. It’s a prime opportunity to keep growing, and I don’t want to miss out while I’m still soaking up knowledge at this stage in my career. I’m excited to see what new challenges and opportunities will come as Blink continues to expand.

‍

‍

The workplace is evolving — and so is the way we communicate.

Gone are the days when communication flowed in just one direction, from the boardroom to the break room. Today, the most successful organizations view internal communications as a conversation — not a broadcast.

Consider this: Companies with highly engaged employees are 21% more profitable. And what’s one of the biggest drivers of engagement? Employees who feel heard.

That’s where two-way communication comes in. It’s not just a strategy; it’s the key to creating a thriving, connected workplace. Let’s explore what two-way communication really means — and why it’s the backbone of modern employee engagement.

What is two-way internal communications?

Traditionally, employee communications were one way. Leadership would put out a message, which would then be cascaded downward to managers and employees.

A top-down approach established the C-suite as the primary source of internal communication. It also made it difficult for employees to speak up and be heard.

Two-way communication is different. It incorporates three types of communication:

• Top-down communication
• Bottom-up communication
• Peer-to-peer communication

With channels that support these three types of communication, information moves in all directions. Leaders still share company updates — but this multi-pronged approach gives employees the chance to contribute to the company conversation, too.

They can respond to employee surveys, comment on posts in the company news feed, ask questions in town hall meetings, and send instant messages to peers and managers. Information is shared quickly and openly, just as it is on the social media platforms we’ve all grown accustomed to.

In a culture of two-way communication, employees are no longer just passive consumers of internal communications, but active participants in it. And the benefits this can bring to any organization are substantial.

Why does two-way communication matter?

Poor communication is bad for the employee experience: You’re unlikely to foster a positive employee experience without an effective internal communications strategy.

And poor communication isn’t just bad for culture — it’s bad for business, costing an estimated $15,000 per employee per year on loss of time, productivity, and profit.

Adopting two-way communication is a meaningful way to improve communications at your organization — and it comes with a host of business benefits. Here are all the reasons two-way communication lies at the foundation of any modern workplace.

{{get-your-internal-comms-health-score="/callous"}}

#1. Better engagement with internal communications

Imagine a conversation with the chattiest person you know. They’re talking nonstop and you struggle to get a word in edgeways. Because you don’t get a chance to speak, you disengage and stop really listening to what is being said.

It’s the same in company-wide conversations. When employees are allowed an active role in communications, they engage more with your message. They’re a lot less likely to ignore your internal content — and a lot more likely to read your comms and take the desired action.

{{mobile-stories="/image"}}

‍

#2. Better overall employee engagement

Two-way communication doesn’t just improve engagement with internal messages. It enhances employee engagement across the board.

We know that highly engaged employees are 3x more likely to say they feel heard at their workplace than their highly disengaged counterparts. When employees know that their thoughts and opinions matter to leadership, you improve their satisfaction, motivation, and sense of belonging.

#3. Creating a feedback loop

When you facilitate two-way communication, you get constant feedback from employees. Employee comments, questions, and survey responses help you build a picture of what works — and what doesn’t — in regards to your internal communications.

You’ll develop a better understanding of which messages are cutting through and which are creating employee uncertainty. This knowledge helps you to craft better, more effective employee communications going forward.

{{mobile-survey="/image"}}

‍

#4. Fostering a culture of transparency and trust

No matter the content controls you put in place, opening up your communications to employees requires transparency and trust on the part of your leadership team. 

Leaders must be willing to share information on company goals and challenges. They also need to be happy to field employee questions in response to that information.

When leaders demonstrate this level of transparency and trust, employees are more likely to follow suit. You create a company culture in which open communication is valued — and where employees feel comfortable sharing their opinions and concerns.

#5. Promoting inclusion

According to The Workforce Institute, 83% of UK employees say people at their organization are not heard fairly or equally — and 46% say that underrepresented voices are undervalued.

Adopting a policy of two-way communication gives space to previously unheard voices. With the right ethos — and the right internal communications platform — you ensure that all employees are empowered to speak up and be heard.

This leads to greater mutual understanding. It also helps you to create a more inclusive workplace, where everyone feels valued.

#6. Creating coworker connection

Peer-to-peer connection is another beneficial result of two-way communication in the workplace. Over internal communication channels, employees get the chance to build meaningful relationships with coworkers.

This is particularly important for remote and frontline employees, who may spend the majority of their days working alone. Two-way communication channels prevent isolation and disconnection and promote a sense of belonging.

#7. Boosting employee productivity

74% of employees say they are more effective at their jobs when they feel heard.

In a culture of two-way communication, employees get information on policies, tasks, and expectations. But they also get the chance to clarify any uncertainty. With a clear idea of their role and responsibilities, employees are more efficient and less likely to make mistakes.

It’s also easier for coworkers to collaborate with one another. Whether they’re based in the same office — or in completely different locations — employees can share their knowledge and insights, granting a further boost to workforce productivity.

{{mobile-teams-call="/image"}}

#8. Reducing employee churn

Research shows that 1 in 3 employees would rather quit or switch teams than voice their true concerns to management. This makes open, trusting, two-way communication channels a crucial part of employee retention.

When employees feel that they can voice their concerns with managers, managers get a chance to respond. They can make changes to the employee experience and encourage employees to stay.

How can you foster two-way communication in your workplace?

Two-way communication requires effective internal communication tools and channels — and this is where a modern employee experience platform (like Blink) can help.

Whether you’re reexamining your current employee communications platform and exploring alternatives, start by looking at solutions that give employees a voice.

A great way to power two-way communication is by starting to use interactive channels like:

• A news feed
• Instant messaging
• Employee surveys
• Digital forms
• Modern intranet

Your platform should make it easy for leadership to share company updates. And for employees to share their thoughts and questions with coworkers, managers, and the C-suite.

By embracing these technologies, internal comms teams can create an inclusive environment where every voice is heard and every employee feels connected.

Blink. And see how you can facilitate two-way communication in your workplace.

Is your comms still cutting it — or has your strategy fallen behind the times?

Any comms strategy worth its salt is totally up to date — because internal comms trends and employee expectations evolve fast.

What worked even a year ago might already feel tired to employees. That means your messages land with less impact, and the engagement you were counting on slips away.

So how can you tell if your internal communication strategy is still working — or whether it’s time for a refresh?

Start by watching for these tell-tale signs that your approach needs a glow-up in 2025 and beyond.

6 signs you need to upgrade your internal communication plan

#1. You’re still broadcasting, not conversing

Top-down comms were once the norm. But employees are no longer happy to be the passive recipients of company news. Why? We can point the finger firmly in the direction of social media.

Thanks to the likes of Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, we’ve been publishing our own content for decades. We’ve also been interacting with big brands and celebrities who were once completely off-limits.

Employees expect a similar experience in the workplace. To the point that top-down communication now feels like a form of gatekeeping.

When you broadcast information instead of starting a conversation with your workforce, they’re left thinking: What have they got to hide? Are they scared of employee feedback? Is the organization simply uninterested in what we think? 

This lack of trust and transparency harms the employee experience. And if this sounds familiar, you need to flip the script.

How? With a culture of two-way communication — and the communication tools that can facilitate it. Think interactive news feeds, polls, surveys, and leader Q&As.

The C-suite still shares essential information. But employees can reply, react, and respond to messages. They can share their ideas via polls and surveys. They can spark conversations with co-workers and managers.

You make employee communications more interactive, improving comms engagement in the process.

{{mobile-survey="/image"}}

#2. Your engagement metrics are mysterious… or missing entirely

You can’t fix what you can’t measure.

If you don’t know who’s opening your messages, which channels are driving the most engagement, or how comms are actually landing across your workforce, you’re working in the dark. And you’ll struggle to make targeted internal comms improvements.

Modern communication tools give you easy access to reliable internal communications metrics. You can:

• Get real-time data on reach, employee sentiment, employee engagement, and more
• Draw links between your comms performance and company KPIs, like customer experience, employee retention, and business revenue
• Segment your data to shine a spotlight on the departments, teams, and locations where comms aren’t cutting through

With the effective tools for analytics and reporting, you can put data at the center of your internal communications plan. Which means less instinct, more insight — and meaningful comms improvements.

{{analytics="/image"}}

#3. Everything sounds like it was written by legal

You know the tone. Overly polished, overly cautious, super-jargony corporate speak. The kind of language that makes every internal message feel like you’re wading through a set of terms and conditions.

This type of language is completely forgettable. It’s unlikely to spark interest, engagement, or interaction — particularly with younger generations within your workforce. And it takes longer for even your smartest employees to read.

So is your comms TOV giving more corporate robot than relatable human? Try reading your messages out loud. If it doesn’t feel like something you’d actually say to someone face-to-face, it’s probably way too formal for your internal communication channels.

To fix it, you can humanize your comms in the following ways:

• Use plain language — no long and complicated words, confusing acronyms, or corporate jargon
• Use a conversational tone — writing more or less as you speak
• Break up long blocks of text — this makes messages less overwhelming and easier to scan and read
• Show a bit of personality — empathy, gentle humor, and the odd personal anecdote go a long way

Above all, remember that the role of comms isn’t just to inform employees — it’s to connect with them. And it’s much easier to do that when you sound real and relatable.

{{less-is-more="/callouts"}}

#4. Frontline workers feel left out

Frontline communication is too often an afterthought. And it’s harming the frontline employee experience.

Most legacy internal communication tools were designed for desk-based workers, so they don’t translate to a mobile format. They also require a corporate email address — something many frontline employees simply don’t have.

You can survey your frontline workers to find out what they think of your comms. And — if they’re feeling left out of the company conversation — this is another sure-fire sign your comms strategy needs some TLC.

The golden rule? If it doesn’t work well on mobile, it doesn’t work for everyone.

So in 2025, you need to go beyond paper memos, personal messaging apps, and word-of-mouth information to embrace mobile-first communication tools, suited to frontline workers.

These tools provide an exceptional experience on desktops and smartphones. And they give all employees easy and intuitive access to company comms, culture, and connection.

{{mobile-chat="/image"}}

#5. Your comms channels are working against you

Got a strategy that starts and ends with email? Or SharePoint? Or — on the flip side — so many channels that no one knows where to look?

Both extremes create issues. A one-channel approach makes it hard to reach everyone. But piling on too many platforms without a clear strategy leads to confusion, noise, and missed messages.

Different employees prefer different communication styles. Gen Z might favor short, social-style updates. Other generations may be happy with email. But when there’s no central system or channel clarity, employees are left asking: “Wait — where was that shared?”

Worse still, your internal communications team ends up unsure where to publish updates, and messages get scattered across tools. The result? Diluted impact, clutter, and poor reach.

The fix? Create a unified company communications hub that serves as a single source of truth and supports a mix of clearly defined channels — with audience segmentation baked in.

That might include:

• Instant messaging for real-time collaboration
• A news feed for top-down updates
• Communities for employee-generated content and co-worker conversation
• A content hub or resource center for evergreen info
• Targeted notifications based on role, location, or department

This structure reinforces important messages, helps employees find what they need, and keeps your comms ecosystem organized, strategic, and effective.

{{mobile-stories="/image"}}

#6. You’re still treating comms like a service, not a strategy

Your internal comms team deserves a seat at the strategy table. But in many organizations, this still simply isn’t the case.

27% of internal comms professionals surveyed by Gallagher said they lacked leadership buy-in and were left out of decision-making. Many comms teams are still treated like a message delivery service, rather than a strategic partner.

This is one of the biggest comms mistakes you can make. Because when internal communications are involved in corporate strategy from the outset, they can:

• Drive alignment across the entire company
• Improve change communications
• Super-charge company culture
• Connect boardroom and breakroom like never before

With top-level insight and input, your comms team finds it easier to achieve the metrics laid out in your internal comms plan — and achieve metrics relating to wider business performance. We’re talking productivity, employee retention, and employee engagement.

{{get-your-internal-comms-health-score="/callouts"}}

How does your comms strategy stack up?

If you’ve identified one or more of these internal communications issues, rest assured that you’re not alone — and you’re not stuck.

Every one of these challenges is fixable. In fact, just recognizing the gaps in your strategy is the first step toward building a smarter, more effective communications plan.

What next? Upgrade your internal communications strategy and tools to reflect the needs and expectations of the modern workforce.

A modern comms plan is flexible, human, and data-driven. It supports the sharing of relevant, personalized communications to every member of your workforce. It meets employees where they are — over mobile-first tools and a rich mix of communication channels.

Most of all, an up-to-date strategy recognizes that modern internal comms is not just a service but a vital part of your corporate culture, change initiatives, and employee experience.

‍Blink. And give your internal comms strategy the makeover it needs.

When’s the last time you had a work-related question, opened your phone to Google it, and ended up down a rabbit hole of Tasty slow cooker recipe videos on Instagram?

If the answer is, “Not that long ago,” don’t worry. You’re not alone.

Many people consider social networks a productivity killer. Swiping through an endless stream of dog videos can make it hard to get work done.

Social media apps get a bad rap at work, but that’s because they’re so good at keeping people engaged and interacting.

What if you could harness the power of social media and use it to help your employees engage more at work?

That’s where a social intranet comes in.

You can use a social intranet to make your internal communications as engaging as a playlist of cats riding Roombas (well, almost).

With a social intranet, your employee network becomes more than a dumping ground for company documents — it’s a place where people can collaborate, learn, and feel connected to one another.

Keep reading to learn:

• What is a social intranet?
• Top benefits of a social intranet
• What your social intranet platform should include
• Social intranet best practices
• Final thoughts: what is a social intranet, and how does it benefit you?

What is a social intranet?

A social intranet is a private collaboration platform where workers can access content in one place. It offers social features like commenting and messaging so employees can interact and work together. And unlike traditional intranet solutions, social intranet software uses interactive elements to increase employee engagement and collaboration in the digital workspace.

Since intranets are networks only company employees can access, they serve as internal communications and knowledge management tools.

Why employee apps are the new intranet

Are intranets a thing of the past? In this eBook, learn how to engage with the deskless workforce effectively to build strong, happy frontline organizations.

Download Now

Top benefits of a social intranet

Traditional intranet setups have more restrictions when it comes to posting and interaction. For most employees, it’s like having “read-only” access to company resources.

On the other hand, social intranets give workers permission to create and engage with content. You can use social intranets to share company resources and encourage employees to connect with each other and the content.

Let’s take a look at some of the top benefits of choosing a social intranet over a traditional one.

More employee engagement

Social features such as liking, commenting and messaging help boost employee engagement online.

Deloitte found that improving employee engagement can increase retention by up to 87%. The study also suggests that using social tools internally increases employee satisfaction by 20%.

Socializing intranet with features like instant messaging keeps your employees connected so they’re more likely to feel like they’re part of a team.

Better collaboration

Gone are the days when you had a question at work and you had to walk five desks over to get your answer. With remote working in a digital workspace, your employees may be spread over several states and countries. That can make collaboration a challenge.

Social intranets provide tools that make it easier for your employees to connect and work together by offering features such as status updates and commenting. Activity streams, which are similar to social media news feeds, keep everyone in the loop, and private instant messages (which work like, e.g. Instagram DMs) eliminate the need for lengthy email chains.

Increased productivity

If workplace interruptions get out of hand, they’re a killer on your team’s productivity.

Imagine your marketing department trying to work on a website update, but they keep getting calls from sales reps who can’t find the right assets. Or maybe your website developer is hard at work on that new layout, but they’ve got to field emails from marketing about text updates.

With a traditionally restricted intranet, your employees have to rely on constant calls and meetings to share information.

A social intranet with private messaging and commenting features lets your employees engage with updates on their own time, so they can focus on their priorities without interruption.

Enhanced security

Employees who can’t contribute to their intranet need to find other places to share documents and files. Unfortunately, file-sharing platforms like Google Suite or Dropbox aren’t as secure as your private network.

With a social intranet, you have an added layer of security on your internal knowledge and documents.

What your social intranet platform should include

As you review different social intranet platforms, look for features that help employees connect and collaborate.

Here are some standard social intranet features to look for:

• Commenting, tagging, and messaging for easy social interaction
• Company news feeds and notifications for sharing updates
• Information hub with powerful search capabilities for ease of access
• Communities and forums for collaboration and knowledge-sharing
• Polls and surveys for collecting feedback
• Employee directory so people can get to know each other’s faces even if they haven’t met

Social intranet best practices

According to Prescient Digital Media, only 13% of employees use the company intranet every day. Most companies need to work harder to make their intranet useful for employees.

Here’s how you can set up your intranet to make sure your employees love checking in.

Make contribution easy

You can’t force employee engagement from the top down. Everyone in your organization has something to contribute, so make sure they can.

Empower your employees to share and help them by providing templates and tips for creating content.

Invest in mobile-ready

Businesses aren’t run out of a single headquarters anymore. Remote workers and frontline employees who interact with customers don’t always have access to a laptop or computer.

If you want a social intranet that everyone will use, it must be accessible to your entire workforce. Choose a platform optimized for mobile apps so your deskless workers still get the same online employee experience.

Look for a provider with analytics

How do you know if your social intranet is making a difference? Well, you won’t – unless you track its analytics.

Marketers use engagement analytics to measure the success of every campaign. You should take the same approach to internal communications.

Find a software provider that gives you insight into your digital workforce so you can take action.

Specifically, look for tools that track:

• Total users
• App opens and daily usage
• How much content is created
• How much interaction each post receives
• What type of feed content performs the best
• Top content contributors

By tracking your workforce analytics, you can figure out what type of content works for your team and create more of it. Without them, you risk investing a lot of time for a small reward.

Final thoughts: what is a social intranet, and how does it benefit you?

Staying connected in the digital workplace is vital. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Businesses need tools that adapt to ‘new normals’ and still keep employees connected.

The best social intranet is also a modern intranet.

It helps you create an internal comms resource your employees will actually want to use. No matter where your people are, they can log on and feel connected to the company and supported in their work.

Learn more about social intranet solutions built for employee engagement and retention with Blink.

‍

Employee engagement and employee experience are two of the most discussed topics in HR.

But the relationship between them — how one leads to the other, and what that means for your strategy — doesn’t always get the same amount of attention.

It’s less a case of employee experience vs. employee engagement and more a case of employee engagement and employee experience. The two aren’t competing concepts. They’re cause and effect.

When employees enjoy a positive workplace experience — with the tools, information, relationships, and support they need to do their jobs well — engagement follows naturally.

That being said, there are a few key differences between these terms. Let’s start by taking a closer look.

Employee experience vs. employee engagement: What’s the difference?

A definition of employee engagement

Employee engagement is the degree to which employees feel invested in their work, committed to your organization, and motivated to bring their A-game.

Engaged employees don’t just show up. They take initiative. They bring discretionary effort — the work they do above and beyond their job description, because they genuinely care about the outcome. They advocate for their organization and are significantly less likely to leave.

Employee engagement is measured by:

• How actively employees participate in organizational activities, communications, and initiatives
• Employee productivity and performance
• Employee satisfaction and sentiment
• Employee retention rates

This has a big impact on your business. Organizations with higher levels of engagement consistently outperform those without — in terms of customer satisfaction, productivity, retention, and profitability.

A definition of employee experience

Employee experience (EX) is the sum of every interaction an employee has with your organization, from first contact during recruitment through to their final day.

It’s formed from company culture, workplace communication, career progression opportunities, employee benefits, well-being support, and the tech tools employees use every day.

The interactions that create a sense of belonging, flow, and purpose contribute to a strong employee experience. Those that add confusion or frustration do the opposite. Every touchpoint is an opportunity to bolster — or erode — a positive experience.

The good news? You can actively design an employee experience that works for your organization through a process of employee experience management.

By understanding what employees need from your workplace and systematically improving the moments that matter, organizations can shape an experience that consistently supports engagement.

Employee engagement and employee experience: What’s the connection?

Employee engagement and employee experience may be two separate concepts. But they’re closely related. Employee experience lays the foundations for employee engagement.

An employee experience manager develops an employee experience strategy. They design employee journeys that meet employee needs. Employee engagement then improves.

Here’s how that could play out:

You launch a regular leadership Q&A → Employees feel heard and informed → Trust and company loyalty improve

You train managers to deliver regular employee recognition → Employees feel valued → Motivation and discretionary effort improve

You replace your clunky intranet with a new employee app → All employees access the same up-to-date content hub → Employees feel empowered and performance improves

Ultimately, you can’t engage employees who don’t have the tools to do their jobs. You can’t build commitment from employees who feel disconnected from leadership and culture. You can’t retain employees who don’t feel recognized, developed, or heard.

Engagement activities are unlikely to land unless there’s a solid commitment to employee experience supporting them.

Employee engagement and experience in action

Japanese ramen bar Tonkotsu has 16 restaurants across the UK and 245 frontline employees. Back in 2018, the organization had an employee experience problem.

• Only 10% of staff had access to the resources and documents they needed
• Communication took place over WhatsApp, and employees routinely received work messages on their days off
• With no shared communication channels, building a strong company culture across multiple sites was impossible

Co-founder Emma Reynolds recognized the frustration this was causing and set out to fix it. Tonkotsu partnered with Blink and launched its mobile-first employee app across the workforce.

That meant:

• A content hub: Employees had easy mobile access to relevant documents like updated menus and food safety regulations.
  
  
• Instant messaging: With private and group chat tools, managers could coordinate teams and shifts without resorting to WhatsApp. Intelligent “do not disturb” functions kept work messages to working hours.
  
  
• A news feed: The company could share interactive content, recognizing employee achievements and sharing restaurant updates across sites.

The result? Tonkotsu successfully improved its employee experience. By improving internal communications, processes, and company culture, employees felt more valued and empowered.

Engagement followed. 99% of employees are now active Blink users, and performance and company connection have improved significantly.

Read the full Blink & Tonkotsu case study

Employee experience vs. employee engagement: Who, how, what?

The relationship between employee experience and employee engagement across the employee lifecycle

At each key moment in the employee lifecycle, there’s an opportunity to build a stronger experience and deepen engagement. Here’s what that looks like in practice.

Attraction and recruitment

The recruitment process is the first experience candidates have with your company. A chaotic, uncommunicative, or disrespectful process creates an experience problem before employment has even begun.

Keep candidates informed at every stage. Provide honest timelines. Treat unsuccessful applicants with care — they may be right for a future role, and they’ll talk about their experience regardless. 

When your process is straightforward and transparent, more top talent makes it to the offer stage — and new hires arrive on day one already engaged.

Onboarding

The first 90 days of employment are the most important for long-term engagement and retention. 69% of employees are more likely to stay with a company for at least three years after a great onboarding experience.

A strong onboarding experience:

• Gives new hires immediate access to the tools, information, and people they need
• Sets clear expectations about role, culture, and progression
• Creates open channels for questions and feedback from day one
• Is consistent regardless of role, location, or manager

You can tell if your onboarding experience is having the desired effect on employee engagement by looking for a few key signals.

Is your new hire asking questions? Taking the initiative? Connecting with colleagues? These early behaviors are strong predictors of engagement and long-term retention.

Performance reviews

When performance reviews are done well, they build trust, clarify direction, and give employees a tangible sense of progress. When done poorly, employees leave deflated and uncertain.

To ensure a positive employee experience, reviews need to be structured and fair. Managers should give sensitive, specific, and actionable feedback. They should also take employee career goals and training needs into account.

Organizational change

Engagement relies heavily on clarity, autonomy, and the belief that effort leads to meaningful outcomes. Poor change management undermines all the above. When change is communicated badly, employees experience uncertainty and anxiety. 

EX managers can play a critical role here: ensuring change communications are timely and transparent, explaining what’s changing and why, and providing a clear channel for employee questions.

Organizations that involve employees in change — rather than announcing it at them — consistently see higher engagement through transition periods.

Personal life events

Illness, parental leave, bereavement, and returns to work after extended absence are pivotal moments in employee experience. How an organization responds in these moments has a lasting impact on trust, loyalty, and engagement.

In the best organizations, these moments are designed deliberately — with clear return-to-work processes, structured support, and genuine check-ins. Employees who feel cared for at challenging points in their lives are significantly more likely to feel connected to — and engaged with — your organization. 

Exit

The exit interview is a great opportunity for honest feedback. Departing employees can tell you what contributed to their decision to leave and what would have made them stay.

Plan this experience as carefully as the ones that come before it. A thoughtfully conducted exit interview can surface EX improvements that benefit every employee who follows.

Engaging employees at this point in the employee lifecycle also protects your employer brand and increases the likelihood of future referrals or returns.

Don’t forget: Employees can continue to advocate for — or against — your organization long after they’ve left. So it’s important to make their final experience a good one.

The relationship between employee experience and engagement in day-to-day work

The lifecycle moments above matter enormously. But employee experience and engagement are also built into the daily rhythm of work.

Tech tools

Today’s employees expect workplace technology that works as intuitively as the apps they use in their personal lives. When it doesn’t, the experience impact is significant.

Over half of workers (56%) say tool fatigue — caused by toggling, alerts, and redundant platforms —negatively affects their work each week. And 27% of workers say they regularly use unauthorized tech out of frustration with their employer-provided tools.

The most common digital employee experience issues include:

• Fragmented access — multiple logins and passwords to access workplace systems
• Poor mobile experience — tools designed for desktop use that are difficult or impossible to navigate on smartphone
• Information silos — updates, policies, resources, and conversations scattered across different platforms with no single source of truth
• Notification overload — too many channels competing for attention
• A lack of personalization — tools that don’t fit employee workflows

When you address these issues, and implement tech tools that genuinely work for employees, engagement (with both your software ecosystem and the wider organization) follows.

Internal communications

The quality of internal communication is one of the biggest factors in employee experience.

Good internal communication is timely, two-way, targeted, and accessible on the devices employees actually use. The best messages are engaging — using video, images, and interactive formats that invite comments, reactions, and shares rather than passive receipt.

So are your internal comms up to scratch?

From an experience perspective, ask these questions: Are communication channels easy to use? Do they reach every employee, including those without desktop access? Do they support two-way dialogue or only top-down broadcasting?

And from an engagement perspective: Are employees using the channels provided? Are they raising issues, sharing feedback, and connecting with colleagues? What opinions and feelings are being expressed on internal comms channels?

Read more: 11 intranet content ideas to boost employee engagement

Recognition

When employee recognition hits the mark, employees are more engaged and 45% less likely to leave their roles within two years.

So incorporate regular, timely, and authentic recognition into the employee experience. Deliver it over the channels employees already use, so staff are more likely to actually see it. Encourage peer-to-peer recognition, too.

Good EX design makes it easy for anyone in the organization to recognize anyone else — in just a few taps.

Employee feedback

The feedback experience tells employees whether their voice genuinely matters — and that belief is a major driver of engagement.

If surveys are long and cumbersome, if feedback is collected but never visibly acted on, if feedback channels are inaccessible to frontline workers, you send a clear signal: Speaking up simply isn’t worth the effort.

To craft an effective feedback experience, send out quarterly engagement surveys, pulse surveys, and quick-fire polls. Also, be sure to close the feedback loop — tell employees what you’ve learned and what you’re going to do next, then keep them updated on progress.

When employees see their input lead to visible change, they’re far more likely to keep contributing, sharing ideas, and engaging with your organization.

Driving frontline employee experience and engagement

Frontline employees represent the majority of the global workforce. They’re also the employee group most likely to report poor employee experience and low levels of engagement.

The specific challenges frontline employees face

Frontline workers don’t typically sit at a desk. When they do get access to a desktop computer, it’s usually a shared portal in the break room with a queue forming behind them.

Few frontline workers have a corporate email address, and — working in industries like retail, transit, hospitality, or healthcare — they rarely interact directly with senior leadership or office staff.

This means frontline workers are more likely to feel isolated from company culture, less likely to receive consistent recognition, and less likely to have the tools and information they need.

In organizations with both frontline and desk-based employees, a gap emerges. Almost half (49%) of frontline workers say that there are two separate cultures at play: “One for the frontline and one for everyone else.”

This experience gap is a significant driver of frontline attrition and — among those who stay — low levels of engagement.

What good frontline EX and engagement looks like

Closing this gap and building a better frontline employee experience requires tools and strategies built specifically for the realities of deskless work:

Mobile-first communication. Updates, recognition, and resources delivered to employee smartphones — no memo boards, no word-of-mouth, no corporate email required.

Clear, relevant communication. Frontline workers won’t stop to read a lengthy PDF on a shift. They need succinct, multimedia content targeted to their roles.

Two-way channels. Chat tools, polls, and feedback mechanisms that work on mobile give frontline workers the same ability to contribute as their desk-based co-workers.

Streamlined admin. Shift swapping, leave requests, payslip access — all manageable from the same app, without logging into a separate system.

Co-worker connection. Frontline work can be lonely. Access to workplace communities and instant messaging helps deskless workers connect, collaborate, and experience a real sense of belonging.

When organizations get frontline employee experience right, the impact is huge. Employees get equal access to updates, tools, resources, and development opportunities. They can chat with co-workers and managers and feel part of company culture. 

This improves engagement and retention in frontline teams. 

How to improve employee experience at your organization

Not sure where to start? Here's a practical process for identifying EX issues and addressing them systematically:

Audit your current experience. Gather available data — engagement survey results, attrition rates, platform analytics, HR query volumes. Talk to employees across roles and locations. Identify the employee experiences that are creating the most friction.

Define your goals. Set specific, measurable EX objectives tied to business outcomes — reducing 90-day attrition, improving survey response rates, reducing avoidable HR tickets.

Prioritize high-impact moments. Design employee experience initiatives, focusing first on moments that have the most significant impact on engagement — onboarding, daily communication quality, recognition, and manager enablement.

Invest in the right technology. A mobile-first employee experience platform that reaches every employee — including those without a desk — helps you make EX improvements at scale.

Close feedback loops. Gather employee feedback continuously, act on it visibly, and communicate what you've done. You’ll make employees a valuable source of EX insight.

Measure. Track behavioral signals, sentiment data, and business outcomes to understand your progress.

Iterate. Employee experience is never finished. The organizations with the strongest EX are the ones that treat improvement as a continuous discipline, not a one-time project.

Once you’ve made employee experience an organizational priority, employee engagement activities stand to make a bigger impact.

Want employee engagement inspiration? Take a look at our article: 67 employee engagement ideas that actually work (2026)

Key metrics to measure experience and engagement success

Employee experience design is the input. Employee engagement is the result. But employee engagement scores aren’t the only way to track the success of your initiatives.

We can break KPIs down into three key categories: behavioral signals, sentiment, and business outcomes.

Behavioral signals

Behavioral signals are the observable actions employees take in response to your experience and engagement efforts. Depending on the employee experience changes you’ve been making, this might include:

• Platform adoption and active usage rates
• Survey response rates
• Recognition activity
• Content engagement
• Community participation and joins
• Number of HR and IT tickets
• Benefits enrolment
• Manager check-in frequency
• Internal mobility
• Time-to-completion for key workflows
• Employee referrals

Sentiment data

Sentiment data reveals the why behind those behavioral signals. It gives you great insight into how employees are feeling about their employee experience.

To gather this data, conduct a sentiment analysis of comms channel comments and open-text survey responses. You can also use recordings from any focus groups and one-to-one interviews you’ve conducted, alongside manager feedback.

Business outcomes

This layer of your measurement stack connects experience and engagement to organizational performance. It’s a way to go beyond employee engagement as the definitive KPI, and make the case for ongoing investment in EX and engagement initiatives. 

Metrics related to business outcomes include:

• Employee retention
• Absenteeism
• Time-to-proficiency for new hires
• Customer satisfaction scores
• Productivity per employee
• Quality / error / defect rates
• ROI on employee learning
• Revenue and growth
  

Viewed together, these three layers of measurement give organizations a coherent, evidence-based picture of what’s working, what isn’t, and where to focus next.

Employee experience and engagement software: Tools that support your strategy

The right technology makes EX and engagement initiatives scalable, consistent, and measurable. They have a positive impact on your EX and engagement capabilities — and on the digital employee experience, too.

But there are lots of software solutions out there, all claiming to provide what you need. So how do you choose the right tools for your organization?

First, bear in mind that some software acts as a point solution. It addresses only one aspect of experience or engagement while leaving gaps that require additional tools. Using these tools, you can end up with a chaotic tech stack that undermines the very experience you’re trying to improve.

The best employee experience and employee engagement software consolidates multiple capabilities into a single, intuitive platform. 

When evaluating your options, look for:

• Interactive employee communication channels — a news feed, chat, live Q&As, and community spaces that support genuine two-way dialogue
• A unified content hub — searchable, up-to-date, and accessible from any device
• Survey and recognition tools — built-in and mobile-accessible
• HRIS and systems integrations — with the deep connections and single sign-on capability that help to streamline workflows
• AI-powered personalization — so you can automatically deliver the right content to employees at the right time
• Analytics — real-time visibility into engagement, content performance, and adoption by team and location

Most importantly: Employees have to want to use it. That means choosing mobile-first software that offers the same consumer-grade experience as the apps employees use in their personal lives. Because a platform nobody uses will fail to move the dial on either experience or engagement.

Start your search: 15 best employee experience software platforms for 2026

Employee experience and employee engagement: Two sides of the same coin

Employee experience and employee engagement aren’t separate initiatives. They’re two sides of the same organizational commitment to its people.

Get the experience right — the tools, the communication, the recognition, the development, the culture — and engagement follows. Let the experience decline, and no engagement initiative will compensate for it.

The organizations that understand this relationship, invest in the infrastructure to support it, and measure it with the rigor it deserves are the ones building workforces that perform and stay.

Blink. And learn how our mobile-first platform supports both EX and engagement.