It Takes Two: Why Building a Rewarding Employee Experience Requires a Partnered Approach

The success of any business or team is rarely the result of one person or cause. More often than not, it's the outcome of several factors, such as work that matters, opportunities beyond expectations and inspiring leadership.

There is one factor in particular, however, that many organizations regard as the ultimate ingredient for success: a rewarding employee experience. And much like achieving success, attaining a fulfilling employee experience is also dependent on several factors – and one could argue the exact same components: work that matters, opportunities beyond expectations and inspiring leadership.  

So as a leader, how do you ensure you're building a rewarding employee experience? As SVP and Chief Auditor, I can say that in Audit, we've implemented measures to create a favourable experience for all of our employees. But it wasn't a solo endeavour; our partners were integral in helping us achieve this outcome.

To gain some perspective on the matter, I sat down with Susy Michor, VP of Human Resources at TD – one of our most valued partners – to hear her thoughts on how working together has helped create a mutually rewarding employee experience for both my team and hers, and what advice she can offer others to accomplish the same in their workplace.

Here’s Susy's story:

Early on in her career, Susy learned that in order to make an impact and have a 'seat at the table', she had to earn it. How? She took the time to get to know her business – its objectives and drivers of success – as well as her leaders and employees. What makes them wake up every morning excited and motivated to come to work? And more importantly, what are they not motivated by and where can the organization do better?

In other words, Susy realized the importance of building and maintaining strong relationships – with her business, her leaders, and with each member of her team. By doing so, she was not only able to make an impact in her career but was also able to enrich the experience of those she worked with in the process.

Prioritize relationship building.

Building solid relationships is more than just exchanging corporate niceties. To build relationships that will make a positive impact, you need to really understand the other parties' involvement – what they bring to the table, and how you can best support them.

"Sometimes you just need to go in, roll up your sleeves, see what your partners do and then practice doing a little bit of what they do," explained Susy.

Susy had the opportunity to do this when she recently shadowed our auditors and gained insight into how they interact with the business – what their objectives, processes and controls are.

"I was able to see first-hand the relationships they have and how they impact and influence. It really allowed me and my team to holistically think about, from an HR perspective, what are the talent strategies we need to put into place to help our employees be successful in what they do every day?"

This experience allowed Susy to gain a deeper understanding of the capabilities needed – employees who needed to be developed further, or where we required new and different skills altogether. As a result, Susy and her team became better equipped to help us achieve our business objectives, and consequently, provide a favourable experience for our employees.

Invest in your people.

As leaders, one of our priorities – if not our top priority – is to ensure our employees have an experience that is inspiring, rewarding and also conducive to both their personal and professional growth and success. In Audit, this means ensuring we have the right controls, procedures and processes in place for mitigating risk – but that's not all.

As our partner, Susy and her team have been able to examine Audit's leadership focus quite closely and identify exactly what we're looking to accomplish when it comes to the growth of our people.

"Audit has a very robust people and talent strategy, and I would say this is a direct reflection of the focus of the leadership team, which involves asking questions like, 'How do we continue to build our talent? How do we ensure that our people feel equipped to have what they need to be successful?" Susy explained.

Setting your team up for success involves investing in each member's potential. This could mean providing the right tools and technologies, or developing learning initiatives such as 'Teach Don't Tell' – a practice to coach our employees through questions to help them develop their own judgment, rather than providing the answer every time our team asks a question. 

Approach recognition thoughtfully.

Recognizing the efforts and accomplishments of your employees is one of the most – if not the most – important element for creating a rewarding employee experience. But recognition isn't necessarily something that's always given – it can also be received indirectly.

For Susy, in her own career, recognition came from the opportunity she was given to work within several different areas of the bank, which allowed her to diversify her experience and strengthen her portfolio.

"I feel that I've been recognized by having the opportunity to work in multiple lines of business. And that's not just progressing to more senior roles, but also the opportunity to apply my knowledge and move laterally; to do what I do and love for different areas of the organization," explained Susy.

From the time she spent shadowing our auditors, Susy, interestingly enough, identified the same source of recognition amongst our employees.

"I find that today, our employees don't want to perform an activity for the sake of doing it," said Susy. "They want to know how it will impact not just their team, but their broader function; how does it impact the bank and also the industry? From my shadowing, I could see that Audit offers the opportunity for employees to understand and see their impact and influence across different areas of the bank."

As you can see, there isn't a cookie-cutter approach for how Susy and her team provide HR support – much like there isn't just one method for enriching our employee experience. By strengthening relationships with business partners, investing in the unique qualities of your team and providing a more evolved form of recognition, an employee experience that enriches, inspires and rewards will become less of a far-reaching goal and more of an everyday reality. 

What are your top factors for creating a rewarding employee experience and helping your team thrive? Share your thoughts in the comments below!