Go Beyond Fixing Broken IT to Improve the Digital Employee Experience

When it comes to improving an organization's Digital Employee Experience (DEX), most are using some sort of Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM) tool to help them observe, measure, analyze and remediate issues on end-users' devices that are impacting their experience. Most often, organizations start by leveraging these tools to find problems where IT is not working as expected, whether it's CPU/Memory/Disk being maxed out, slow Wi-Fi or application crashes. All of these are contributors to negatively impacting the end-user experience.

But what if the DEX/DEM solution could be leveraged to improve the user's experience in "normal" but maybe not optimal scenarios? 

Technology is frustrating for many users who are not tech-savvy, and what is expected behavior for IT professionals can leave end-users exasperated. Because DEX/DEM solutions can see what is happening on the user's device and take action, it can be easy to identify new use cases to deploy that improve the end-user's productivity and experience.

Reducing user friction with security

Endpoints are recognized as one of the biggest threats to the security of an organization's systems and data. As a result, there are typically several security agents on an end-user's device to help protect against threats. While necessary for the organization, many users see these as hindrances to productivity, either by slowing down their system or denying them the ability to do what they want on their devices.

A common security practice is to deny the installation or running of applications that were not approved and installed by IT. However, users may get caught in the middle by a self-updating application or new software that they need to complete their work. DEX/DEM solutions can be leveraged to reduce this friction for both the user and IT.

• For the user: DEX/DEM solutions can be configured to watch for the security tool's application denial and notify the user when it occurs. The user can be given the option to have the solution open a service desk ticket on their behalf, requesting that the application be added to the allowed list. This reduces the security friction for the end user as it automates what would be a manual process and one they would probably not even do on their own.
• For IT: Because the DEX/DEM solution is opening the ticket, it can ensure that all of the necessary information is included in the ticket, which is often not completed properly by end users. The tool can attach the user and device information, the application executable name and path, and even run a script to capture any relevant log files. When reviewing the request, this enables IT to have all of the information they need to quickly approve or deny the request, streamlining the process.

Improving a user's new device experience

When a user receives a new device, either for the first time or as part of a refresh, there is often a bit of user anxiety in having to set things up again and lose productivity for a few hours or days afterward. While solutions such as Microsoft OneDrive can sync all of the user's files, and Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) solutions can automatically install/reinstall all of the user's applications automatically, there normally is still some setup and configuration required.

Using a DEX/DEM solution, an organization can trigger sentiment messages to the users during their first day, week and even month of a new device. These can ask for feedback from the user on how the new device is working and offer to connect them to IT or provide links to common frequently asked questions (FAQs) for setting up a new device based on those responses. For example, when a user gets a new phone, a message could be sent to the user on the day the device is delivered with a link to the new phone guide that tells them how to enroll it in the company's Mobile Device Management (MDM) tool and how to perform the migration of their application data such as their authenticator app.

DEX/DEM solutions can be combined with UEM solutions to help users avoid some of the unexpected challenges with new devices. For example, Omnissa Workspace ONE Experience Management, combined with Workspace One UEM, can facilitate the delivery of Zoom to users' endpoints and proactively prevent issues when they join their first meeting. 

When a user on a new Mac receives Zoom via UEM, Intelligence can detect the new installation and send the user a message asking if they would like to open system settings to grant permissions for the microphone, camera and screen sharing. This helps to prevent the user from encountering permissions issues during their first meeting, which would otherwise require them to restart the Zoom meeting, necessitating them to leave and re-join. This greatly reduces one pain point for users of new devices while also increasing productivity.

Driving user confidence and adoption

A struggle for many organizations is around training, adoption, and success of their applications and initiatives. No matter how many emails, knowledge articles, lunch and learns, or training classes you have, there will always be users who struggle to use new or occasionally used applications. Whether you are migrating from a legacy application to a new modern web application, or simply completing annual required training, the successful completion seems to always have one or more of the following challenges:

• Low compliance for mandatory training/enrollment.
• Less than expected usage trends for new applications or compliance for mandatory training/enrollment.
• An increase in support tickets that are usually user training-related.
• Missing or incorrect data entered due to lack of proper understanding.
• Lower productivity due to slower use and navigation of the application.

An example of this would be during a company's annual performance reviews. Let's think about the typical process. First, there is usually an email telling them to start their review, that they may either miss, ignore, postpone due to more pressing work or even delay because of apprehension in completing it.  There are also many new hires in an organization that have never been through the performance review process and may not complete the review properly. All of these elements increase the level of frustration and effort across all levels of the company to complete the review process.

Using solutions such as Nexthink Engagement and Adopt, campaigns could be built to target returning employees and customized for new hires. These Engage campaigns would offer to help employees start their annual review with a step-by-step walkthrough of the process. Once they are in the review tool, Adopt guides the user with in-app guidance that can show them what steps to take and tips for how to complete the various fields. These can show up as a pop-up help on each field to fill out, walk-through of the different steps or screens, and even data validation as they fill it out. This goes beyond what is usually a static FAQ page or PDF that the user has to toggle back and forth from and typically has outdated screenshots. Instead, guidance and hints are right there in the app and become part of the workflow and navigate with the user through the whole process. This gives the users the confidence to complete their reviews accurately and helps to reduce aimless user navigation while improving user proficiency and adoption.

Never miss a password change again

Password resets are one of the most prevalent issues that send users to IT seeking help. While password changes have been a long-standing security practice that users have been through many times, the process and experience are still common sources of friction in the user experience. Password changes are an inconvenient task for end users and many will choose to wait until they are close to their expiration to make the change, which increases the risk that they will simply forget about it until it is too late. Adding on top of that is the fact that on Windows devices, toast notifications are very gentle reminders that are easily overlooked, and automated email reminders often go unopened due to notification fatigue.

DEX/DEM solutions can improve communication to end users about their upcoming password expirations and handle multiple scenarios for how to address a user who is nearing their expiration date.  Riverbed's Aternity DEX solution can detect when a user's password is nearing expiration and automatically prompt the user to change their password with a more overt pop-up notification that is difficult to ignore. This avoids the problem of overly gentle toast notifications and can be employed when the user is close to their expiration date and escalated as they near the cutoff. The notification text can be tailored, and buttons can be configured to allow the user to open a link to detailed reset instructions. Optionally, the ability to dismiss the message can be removed, allowing only temporary postponement that will remind the user again. 

Going a step further, Aternity's Intelligent Service Desk (ISD) Runbooks can execute a workflow that handles multiple potential paths of logic based on certain conditions. For example, the ISD Runbook could avoid sending pop-up notifications to VIP users, instead opening a ticket for the Executive Support team to schedule time with the person. The ISD Runbooks are an orchestration engine that is designed to be open and flexible, so you could get even more creative and leverage an API connection to Microsoft's Graph API to check if the person currently has an out-of-office message configured and send an email to their manager if so, or have a workflow to send a Teams message to the user in addition to a pop-up notification to engage on more channels.  

Utilizing an automatic process to improve communication with users and to approach different situations with the appropriate actions prevents avoidable calls for support, reduces downtime from account lockouts and improves overall user experience by helping users avoid common password expiration pitfalls.

Optimizing experience through intelligent right-sizing

Another often-overlooked opportunity for DEX/DEM solutions is in hardware right-sizing across the organization. While IT teams typically offer standard hardware configurations based on job roles, this one-size-fits-all approach can lead to both over-provisioning and under-provisioning of resources. Trust us: not all software developers and their work are the same, and if they are all working off the same specs, when it's not right for them, your IT team will hear about it! It's even worse when you don't hear about it as those users will probably leave or tell all of their friends and colleagues.

DEX/DEM solutions such as Lakeside SysTrack can continuously monitor actual hardware utilization patterns — from processor and memory usage to storage needs and peripheral device usage — across different user groups and workloads. This data-driven, persona-based approach enables organizations to make more informed decisions about hardware specifications, ensuring users have exactly what they need to be productive without unnecessary overhead. 

For example, some users classified as "power users" may only need mid-range systems based on their actual usage patterns, while others on standard configurations might benefit from additional memory or faster storage based on their specific workload demands. By understanding these real-world usage patterns, organizations can optimize their hardware refresh cycles and budget allocation while simultaneously improving the end-user experience through properly matched resources.

• Give the user what they need: Without right-sized hardware, users can be frustrated by a device that can't seem to keep up with their workload. Imagine giving a graphic designer and sales executive the same device. The graphic designer may feel bogged down by minimal graphics cards or lack of memory when trying to work on high-resolution graphics, while the sales executive is frustrated by an overprovisioned machine that is hard to transport when on the road and in customer meetings.
• Become the hero: When IT proactively gives the user what they need, they not only help prevent user frustration, but they can also help save the organization significant costs. In one example with Lakeside Software, a global enterprise evaluated endpoint data on 5,000 laptops planned for refresh. They determined 1,400 could be replaced by Chromebooks and identified a savings opportunity of nearly $1 million.

Finding your nirvana

Wherever you are in your journey to a digital experience nirvana, WWT experts can help you align your mission, organizational priorities, and guiding principles. This process starts with a data-driven DEX strategy for intelligent decision-making, combined with practical strategies for effectively monitoring experiences. This will allow you to optimize digital workflows, empower employees and enable your organization to thrive.