The 7 stages of the employee experience lifecycle explained

When an you join an organisation, you take the ultimate leap of faith. No amount of online sleuthing can fully prepare you for your new corporate unknown, and it’s up to us as people leaders to make employees feel safe, secure and appreciated from the get-go.

From attracting new recruits, to getting them up to speed and keeping them engaged, to the final, teary goodbyes, every stage of the employee experience lifecycle comes with its own challenges and opportunities. So, in a time where finding and retaining the right people is harder than ever, how can we elevate employee experience and hang onto top talent? 

What is the employee experience lifecycle?

Put simply, the employee experience lifecycle covers every stage an employee goes through that links them to your company. This starts with building awareness and attracting candidates and ends with offboarding.

Developing a detailed strategy for your employee lifecycle can bring great business benefits, driving higher retention rates, better talent attraction and improved employee engagement. What’s more, investment in each stage gives HR leaders access to all-important employee data, helping to develop even better data-driven insights and strategies.

The 7 stages of the employee experience lifecycle

Let’s dive into how HR leaders can thrive at every stage of the employee lifecycle, as well as the KPIs to track success.

1. Attraction

Unfortunately, love at first sight is a term rarely applied to finding a new company. Attracting potential candidates to your organisation can be tricky, so look at this stage of the employee lifecycle like bagging a first date.

Producing blogs or video content that highlight the great things about working at your company, like unique employee benefits, an emphasis on work/life balance and company events, makes you look much more attractive to any talent on the prowl. Gold star if you can encourage employees to make their own user-generated content (UGC) for maximum authenticity. 

Track the success of content with views and click-through data to see what resonates with potential candidates and makes them ‘swipe right’ and apply.           

2. Recruitment

For the employee cycle’s recruitment phase, start with writing an engaging, SEO-optimised job advert to make your role stand out and attract attention. Point candidates towards your content, write the ad in a style that reflects your culture and ensure that you're advertising on the right platforms and social media channels.

This phase also includes the interview process, where a seamless selection, scheduling and feedback process is crucial. Make sure that application forms include nods to company culture to attract candidates who are a good fit and provide timely feedback for any interviewees. Keep an eye on the number of applicants and job ad views, tracking the percentage of suitable candidates to further hone your strategy and job ads.

3. Onboarding

Time to join the team! Onboarding with some branded swag and chocolatey treats is all well and good, but this is also the perfect time to embed your company values and put people at ease from day one. 

Create an induction process that promotes your culture and equips your new starters with everything they need to hit the ground running – important to soothe any first-week worries and lighten the load on HR teams and managers. Set out a clear process with regular manager check-ins and assigned buddies to make sure they stay on the right track. After onboarding, gather feedback from new starters to continually improve the process and provide any additional support.

4. Development

Development is a core part of the lifecycle to invest in employee growth and build your internal skillset. Most of us need to feel challenged to get true job satisfaction, so building a solid career development plan is a great way to show employees that you care. Think courses, webinars, lunch and learn sessions – anything that gets employees’ brains whirring.

But it’s not just traditional training methods that can boast great results. Peer-to-peer and reverse mentoring are great ways to learn skills and enhance relationships between colleagues. Everyone has unique knowledge to share, and mentoring helps staff to gain inspiration and new insights. Track attendance at training sessions and uptake of mentoring schemes to continually adjust programs to suit employee interests.

5. Engagement

Employee engagement hinges on staff feeling happy, included, and supported. And ultimately, improving employee engagement fosters a more collaborative workforce and improves customer experience. This stage of the employee lifecycle is about diving into employee data and identifying what your staff need to maximise engagement. Meaningful benefits that prioritise employee wholebeing and give employees a bigger sense of purpose are vital. 

For example, retailer Charles Tyrwhitt uses a mix of benefits including employee discounts, recognition and reward and communications, to increase employee engagement scores and reward staff with more than £100,000 in rewards, as well as helping them save over £21k in discounts. A core part of Charles Tyrwhitt's success was recognition, where staff could send branded eCards and see what colleagues in different teams were achieving on a regular basis, bringing their company values, known as “BEliefs,” (referred to internally as the “3BEs) to life. Promoting and tracking recognition is one of the most effective ways to boost engagement.

6. Retention

Just like nurturing any good relationship, becoming complacent and expecting your employee to stick around with little effort is a recipe for disaster. Disinterested and disengaged employees are bound to look elsewhere – and a long list of benefits doesn’t necessarily guarantee success. Miss some all-important check-ins and you might miss out on the opportunity to fix the issue – and ultimately, lose top talent.

Celebrating employees is a great way to boost morale (and retention), with 27% of UK employees who considered leaving their employer citing a lack of recognition as the driver. Use channels such as company-wide newsletters, public recognition, or even just simple notes to recognise achievements or milestones, creating a genuine culture of appreciation. Be proactive and continually track employee sentiment through one-on-ones and company-wide surveys to ensure that no-one slips through the cracks. 

7. Off-boarding

As hard as you try, sometimes employees need to make their next move. But off-boarding staff doesn’t have to be the end! When you wave off your exiting employees, use this as a learning opportunity and a chance to turn leavers into advocates. With exit surveys and interviews, you can gain a true insight into the factors that have pushed employees to leave or pulled them to a new company. These push and pull factors can improve your own employee value proposition (EVP), ensuring that the next wave of candidates feel the benefit.

As for advocacy, encourage those leaving on good terms to share their positive experiences and recommend the company to their connections. It’s important to remember this stage of the employee lifecycle and keep track of referrals, as you never know which talented team members may return in future stages of their career.

How to develop an effective employee lifecycle

Just like every employee, every step of the employee experience lifecycle is important. Understanding the employee journey, anticipating their needs, and continually improving your EVP is vital. And the key to all this? Listening. 

Gather feedback regularly and use these insights to tailor your employee experiences, leveraging technology to make the biggest, quickest wins. It’s one thing knowing what your employees need, but it’s another thing turning words into action. Using an employee experience platform for everything from communication and surveys to recognition, reward, and benefits, is a surefire way to handle every stage of the employee lifecycle seamlessly.

If you're interested in improving the employee experience of your workforce and engaging employees at every stage of their journey with your organisation, speak to one of our experts today to find out more.