Why a Common Experience Framework Matters
“Experience” is the new battleground. Companies are striving to create exceptional experiences for customers, users, employees, and stakeholders alike. However, these efforts often exist in silos, leading to fragmented strategies and missed opportunities. As the visual of “Building Blocks of Experience Optimization” aptly illustrates, it’s time we strive for a common model of experiences — a unified framework that connects all the dots.
Breaking down what silos?
Traditionally, Customer Experience (CX), User Experience (UX), Employee Experience (EX), and other “experience” disciplines have been treated as separate entities. CX focuses on the customer journey, UX on product usability, and EX on the employee lifecycle. While each is crucial, this siloed approach hinders a holistic understanding of how these experiences intersect and influence one another.
The image highlights this fragmentation. Each experience type (Customer, User, Buyer, Member, Employee, Stakeholder/Investor, and Partner) is presented with its own distinct set of building blocks. While there’s value in this specificity, it’s essential to recognize the underlying commonalities.
This holistic perspective is essential for building sustainable success in the experience economy because the ultimate goal is to ensure success requires a shared blueprint of all experiences, not just isolated pockets of excellence.\
The Benefits of a Unified Experience Model:
Holistic Understanding: A common model enables us to see the interconnectedness of different experiences. For example, a positive Employee Experience can directly translate into a better Customer Experience.
Shared Language: A unified framework provides a common vocabulary for discussing and analyzing experiences across the organization. This fosters better communication and collaboration between different teams.
Consistent Approach: A common model ensures consistency in how experiences are designed, measured, and optimized. This leads to a more cohesive brand experience and improved overall performance.
Resource Optimization: By identifying shared needs and pain points across different experience types, organizations can allocate resources more effectively and avoid redundant efforts.
Improved ROI: A holistic approach to experience management can lead to higher customer satisfaction, increased employee engagement, and improved financial performance.
Building blocks of a common Experience model:
Based on the visual, here’s a possible starting point for creating a unified framework:
Phase 1: Understanding Pain Points (or Initial State): Every experience starts with a need, problem, or frustration. Understanding these pain points is the foundation for creating a positive experience. This relates to the “Loss” for stakeholders, “Painpoint” for customers, the need to “See” for users, the absence of “Advice” for Employees, and the lack of “Enablement” for partners.
Phase 2: Addressing Problems: Identify and prioritize the critical issues that need to be addressed to improve the experience. This maps to the “Problems” and the need for an “Operation” in the stakeholders’ experience, the basic “Problem” for the customer, the need to “Think” in User Experience, the need for “Guidance” for the employees and the “Management” in the partners’ experience.
Phase 3: Delivering Solutions: Provide effective solutions that address the identified problems and meet the needs of the individual. Solutions can be found if the company provides an adequate “Operation” (Stakeholder Experience, “Solution” (Customer Experience), the act of “Doing” (User Experience), receiving “Assistance” (Employee Experience), and experiencing “Growth” (Partner Experience).
Phase 4: Achieving Desired Outcome: Optimize the experience to prevent future problems and maximize value creation. If everything goes according to plan, the parties enjoy “Profit” (Stakeholder Experience), “Prevention” of further problems (Customer & Employee Experience, “Caring” (User Experience), and gaining “Insight” (Partner Experience).
From Theory to Practice
Creating a common experience model requires a shift in mindset and a commitment to collaboration. Here are some key steps:
Define Key Principles: Establish a set of guiding principles that will govern all experience-related initiatives.
Map the Journey: Visualize the end-to-end journey for each experience type, identifying key touchpoints and pain points.
Share Insights: Break down the silos and foster open communication between different teams to share insights and best practices.
Develop Common Metrics: Establish a set of common metrics for measuring the success of experience initiatives.
Iterate and Improve: Continuously monitor and optimize the experience based on feedback and data.
Conclusion
In a world where experience is everything, organizations can no longer afford to treat Customer Experience, User Experience, Employee Experience, and other "experience" disciplines as separate entities. To truly excel, companies must recognize that
"You can’t optimize what you can’t see. Mapping every experience, from customer to stakeholder, creates the strategic visibility needed to truly excel."
As my framework reminds us, individual experiences are just pieces of a larger puzzle. We must actively seek to connect these pieces because mapping shared experiences can unlock new opportunities and value for everyone in the organization. This holistic perspective is essential for building sustainable success in the experience economy because the ultimate goal is to ensure success requires a shared blueprint of all experiences, not just isolated pockets of excellence. Only by mapping and integrating every touchpoint, can we optimize value for everyone involved.
Thank you for reading!