Why Making It Invisible Is a Strategic Priority for C-Suite Leaders in Building Enterprise-Wide Employee Engagement

By Geoff Hixon, Lakeside Software

Enterprise digital transformation initiatives are often undermined by organisational skills gaps rather than technological limitations. When employees struggle to use workplace technology effectively, the consequences can extend across departments, affecting productivity, customer experience and business performance.

For example, a sales team might discover that its email automation platform is sending duplicate messages to customers and prospective clients. Further investigation could reveal that other departments, including marketing, are experiencing similar integration failures with their core business systems. These issues demonstrate how technology problems can become wider operational challenges when organisations lack the skills, processes and visibility needed to address them.

In March 2024, research into UK public sector organisations found that 65 per cent of organisations delivering digital transformation projects lacked an overarching data strategy, 87 per cent had not trained employees on new technologies or processes, and 79 per cent had not secured employee buy-in for their transformation plans. The findings suggested that transformation strategies were often driven more by available technology than by organisational needs, with significant gaps in implementation skills.

This challenge is also reflected in Gartner research, which reports that 75 per cent of organisations without structured Digital Employee Experience (DEX) strategies fail to solve operational challenges.

For enterprise leaders, DEX is therefore more than an IT concern. It is a business capability that influences workforce productivity, employee engagement, talent retention and competitiveness.

Why Is Digital Employee Experience Important for Business Performance?

Investment in the digital workplace is essential because friction in everyday technology can carry significant costs for enterprises. Research suggests that poor digital experiences contribute to 50 per cent of employees choosing to leave their jobs. Workers have also reported operating at only 60 per cent of their potential productivity because of technology limitations.

For large organisations, these challenges can contribute to lost productivity, higher recruitment and retention costs, and a weaker competitive position.

Enterprise IT teams face additional pressures, including overwhelmed service desks, complex operating system migrations, hardware lifecycle management and software licence management. Traditional IT metrics, such as device uptime, ticket resolution times and system availability, provide useful operational insights. However, they do not always reveal how employees experience the technology they use every day.

A 2022 study by Lakeside Software found that up to 40 per cent of IT issues go unreported. As a result, many technology problems never appear in help desk systems or performance dashboards.

Without a fuller picture of the digital employee experience, organisations risk overlooking the issues that affect employees' ability to work effectively.

How Can Enterprise Leaders Build a Strategic DEX Framework?

A successful digital employee experience strategy requires executive sponsorship, clear accountability and measurement that connects technology performance with business outcomes. Enterprise leaders can establish this foundation through three priorities.

1. Make DEX a Strategic Business Priority

Enterprise DEX initiatives require C-suite support and cross-functional governance. Rather than treating digital employee experience as an isolated IT responsibility, organisations should position it as a capability that supports broader goals, including talent acquisition, workforce productivity and digital transformation.

This approach helps align technology investments with the needs of employees and the organisation. It also encourages leaders to consider how workplace technology affects business performance, rather than measuring success solely through technical availability.

2. Establish Dedicated DEX Governance

The emergence of roles such as Chief Workplace Experience Officer reflects growing recognition of the strategic importance of employee experience. Organisations should establish clear accountability through dedicated DEX leadership or cross-functional teams with defined responsibilities.

Effective DEX governance requires leaders who understand change management, can collaborate across departments and have the authority to coordinate organisation-wide initiatives. Direct access to executive leadership can also help ensure that DEX programmes receive the resources and influence needed to deliver meaningful improvements.

With the right governance structures, organisations can address employee experience challenges across teams, systems and working environments instead of tackling individual symptoms in isolation.

3. Develop a Comprehensive DEX Measurement Framework

A strong DEX programme needs analytics that go beyond traditional IT metrics. Organisations should combine quantitative performance indicators with qualitative employee feedback to understand both how technology performs and how it affects the workforce.

Relevant measures include:

Business outcomes: employee engagement, voluntary turnover and productivity indicators.

IT performance: service desk resolution times, system performance and incident frequency.

Employee experience: recurring technology friction, application responsiveness and difficulties completing everyday tasks.

Combining these measures can help organisations identify so-called "silent sufferers": employees who experience technology problems but do not report them, or who attempt to resolve issues independently.

According to Lakeside Software, these employees represent around 40 per cent of the workforce. Identifying their challenges is important because unreported issues can remain invisible to IT teams while continuing to affect productivity.

How Can Organisations Improve Employee Buy-In During Digital Change?

Digital workplace initiatives must account for the impact of continuous change on employees. Remote work, return-to-office mandates and the introduction of AI technologies can all require employees to adapt their routines, skills and ways of working.

Without appropriate support, new technology and processes can contribute to change fatigue rather than improve engagement.

Effective change management should include clear communication, advance notice of significant changes and practical training, particularly during onboarding and technology rollouts. Organisations can also identify and train change ambassadors across departments to help colleagues understand new processes and overcome common challenges.

Most importantly, employee engagement requires more than directives from leadership. Employees need to understand why changes are happening, how those changes affect their work and where to turn for support.

The most effective DEX improvements may be those employees barely notice. When technology works reliably and common problems are resolved before they interrupt work, employees can focus on their responsibilities instead of troubleshooting their digital tools.

By making improvements feel supportive rather than disruptive, organisations can increase employee confidence in change initiatives and create better conditions for productivity and engagement.

Why Isn't Technology Alone Enough to Improve DEX?

AI-powered tools, including chatbots and self-healing systems, can help improve productivity and resolve some technology issues automatically. However, technology alone cannot address every challenge associated with digital employee experience.

Enterprises must also invest in the organisational skills and change management capabilities needed to make new tools effective. This includes shifting from reactive IT support towards proactive improvements based on how employees actually use workplace technology.

Continuous improvement depends on gathering reliable evidence about employee needs and technology performance. Feedback tools and surveys can provide useful context, but surveys may be overlooked, completed inconsistently or influenced by an individual's experience at a particular moment.

Behavioural and technology performance data can provide an additional perspective by showing how employees interact with applications, devices and digital services. When collected and interpreted responsibly, these insights can help IT teams identify recurring friction and assess whether DEX improvements are making a meaningful difference.

As employees adapt to new tools, including AI, ongoing monitoring can help organisations understand changing usage patterns and refine their support strategies. The goal is not simply to introduce new technology, but to ensure that it continues to meet organisational and employee needs.

What Is the Best DEX Implementation Roadmap for Enterprise Leaders?

Successful enterprise DEX transformation requires a structured, sustained approach. The following steps can help organisations move from identifying problems to delivering measurable improvements.

1. Assess the current digital employee experience. Establish baseline measures for technology performance, employee satisfaction and common sources of friction. Identify where existing IT metrics provide an incomplete picture.

2. Align DEX objectives with business goals. Connect employee experience improvements to broader organisational priorities, such as productivity, talent retention, digital transformation and customer service. Clear alignment helps build executive support.

3. Establish governance and accountability. Define leadership responsibilities, cross-functional collaboration and decision-making processes. Ensure that the people responsible for DEX have the authority and resources to implement improvements.

4. Introduce appropriate measurement and monitoring tools. Integrate platforms that provide actionable insights into technology performance and employee experience. Use these insights to identify problems, prioritise interventions and assess the effects of changes.

5. Integrate change management and employee support. Coordinate DEX initiatives with wider organisational change programmes. Provide communication, training and support to help employees adapt without unnecessary disruption.

6. Review performance and continuously improve. Monitor outcomes, assess new sources of friction and adjust the programme as employee needs and technology evolve. Use available evidence to identify gaps and reduce the time required to move towards a more productive digital workplace.

A roadmap built around these steps helps DEX evolve from a one-off technology deployment into an ongoing organisational capability.

How Can Organisations Measure DEX Return on Investment?

The return on investment from digital employee experience depends on whether improvements produce measurable business outcomes. Weak data strategies, insufficient training and poor change management can undermine digital transformation regardless of the capabilities of the technology being introduced.

A well-designed DEX programme can help organisations pursue several business benefits:

Higher employee productivity: reducing time lost to slow systems, application failures and repetitive troubleshooting.

Improved employee engagement: making everyday digital tools more reliable and easier to use.

Lower turnover-related costs: addressing workplace technology frustrations that may contribute to dissatisfaction and employees choosing to leave.

Better IT efficiency: identifying recurring issues and preventing some problems before they generate service desk tickets.

Stronger talent attraction and retention: supporting a digital workplace that enables employees to work effectively.

Improved competitiveness: aligning technology investments with the needs of employees and the wider business.

To evaluate these outcomes, enterprises should establish baseline measures, track progress over time and distinguish the impact of DEX initiatives from other organisational changes. Relevant indicators may include employee feedback, productivity measures, incident trends, time lost to technology issues and voluntary turnover.

For C-suite leaders, DEX should not be viewed simply as an IT project. It is a business capability that influences organisational performance, employee satisfaction and strategic competitiveness.

Treating digital employee experience as an ongoing discipline — rather than a one-time technology deployment — helps organisations turn workplace technology from a source of friction into an enabler of productivity and engagement. In an increasingly digital business environment, that shift can support a more resilient and competitive enterprise.