Perhaps ironic coming from an Employee Experience (EX) consultancy, but we always advise our clients to own their EX rather than hand the reins over to an external partner.
EX is a relatively new field, especially in our home base of South Africa. This means that many organisations are still building up their EX competencies in-house and are reliant on consultants to bridge the gap and support their development. While consultancies have a role to play as advisors and guides, ultimately, EX needs to be owned within and across an organisation for it to be successful. The long-term sustainability of EX hinges on it being an integral part of your organisation’s culture and operations.
EX is more than Employee Engagement
To understand why EX requires internal ownership, it’s important to first unpack exactly what EX is and what it isn’t.
EX is often conflated with Employee Engagement (EE). Engagement metrics and tools are easy to outsource to agencies, who are tasked with diagnosing issues and recommending solutions. However, as EX thinker and futurist Jacob Morgan’s model highlights below, employee engagement is actually an outcome of a broader EX strategy—it’s a lag indicator, reflecting the state of your EX rather than shaping it.
Reference: https://medium.com/jacob-morgan/the-employee-experience-cheat-sheet-infographic-c0d6257dbcb8
EX encompasses so much more than engagement metrics. EX is defined by every interaction your employees have with your organisation – how your people feel, think, and connect with their surroundings and each other. There are various different models and schools of thought for getting an optimal EX, but the golden thread across all of them is that the aspects which make a successful EX reside within an organisation, and only the organisation itself has the agency and power to change it for better or worse. EX is a consistent and ongoing practice and cannot be fulfilled by a checkbox exercise or once-off internal marketing campaign.
Locate EX ownership within and across your organisation
Let’s cut to the chase, there are really three main reasons why you need to own your EX.
1. You already own your culture: EX is deeply rooted in an organisation’s culture. It involves understanding and embedding the company’s values, mission, and vision into daily operations. This cultural integration cannot be fully achieved by an external consultancy. Only employees and leaders within the organisation can infuse EX into the fabric of the company culture.
2. EX is not a solo sport: Effective EX requires breaking down silos between departments, and not seeing it as an “HR problem”. It’s about creating a seamless journey that connects every department and employee within your ogranisation. Consultancies can provide the framework and guidance, but the execution and ongoing adaptation need to come from within the organisation itself. Everyone —regardless of their role—impacts and influences EX.
3. EX is never “done”: EX is not a one-time project or a quick fix; it’s an ongoing process. It requires continuous feedback, adaptation, and improvement. External consultancies can’t maintain this level of engagement and iteration. Ownership within the organisation ensures that EX is continually refined and adapted to meet evolving needs.
So, what role should consultancies play in EX?
Consultancies still play a vital role in advising and guiding organisations on employee experience. They bring valuable expertise, tools, and frameworks to help companies understand and implement effective EX strategies.
At Torque, we focus on teaching our clients the basics of EX. We offer upskilling workshops to close the skills gap and prefer hands-on applications rather than just providing solutions. We’re all about empowering organisations to take charge of their employee experience, helping them build their skills and see lasting improvements.
This year, we kicked off our first series of upskilling workshops with some truly inspiring professionals from different industries. We managed to create a fantastic network of knowledge sharing, which is exactly what we’ve always dreamed of. We absolutely love the magic that comes from genuine collaboration and partnership.
Collaborating towards a better EX
Although we will continue standing on our soap box and urge organisations to integrate EX into their core operations and culture, we are not expecting you to do this alone. Leverage the expertise, resources and capacity of external partners. But remember that this should be done in parallel with building up capabilities, ownership and buy-in within and across every department of your organisation.
Want to know more about Torque’s EX capacity building and support? Check us out on https://torque.pro/ or email us on chat@torque.pro
