Tech’s role in people development
Of course, the dawn of the coronavirus pandemic and the move to remote working drastically altered the experiences of employees across the globe. Employee experience has undoubtedly changed; companies are far more digital-centric with comms and learning, many companies are seeing higher turnover and wellbeing is far higher on the C-Suite agenda, and those who have understood how to bridge the gap in culture, inclusion and development digitally, have reaped the rewards. This notion is supported by Deloitte data from late 2020, which found that 75% of workers believe, when their companies have adopted the right tech, their experience as an employee has actually improved, with 55% feeling more productive and 62% believing that their wellbeing has not suffered as a result.
For Kraft Heinz, the adoption of the right technology is now a huge part of its employee experience within career and skills development – something that the company saw as an asset before the coronavirus crisis hit. Bassey said that Kraft Heinz has successfully promoted a ‘culture of continuous learning, bold creativity, and intellectual curiosity’. “This empowers employees to execute with excellence in their current role, accelerate their learning curve and grow a great career,” she said. The company’s aim is not just to manage the employee experience and support career development within Kraft Heinz, but also to help them in building their ‘career journeys’, whether this is within the company or not. It does this through the Kraft Heinz corporate university, known as Ownerversity.
According to Bassey, the academy structure aids in nurturing a continuous culture of learning and gives each employee tools to contribute to the company as a whole. “Our Ownerversity learning experiences include opportunities for employees to learn more about inclusion and belonging, and we deliver a multitude of offerings throughout the year aimed at empowering employees, developing inclusive leaders, interrupting bias across the employee experience, and fostering inclusion and belonging,” she said. This more holistic view of development is backed up by data from SHRM, which found that learning and employee experience are intrinsically linked; employees who feel that their organisation offers opportunities to develop skills outside of their particular role consider themselves ‘highly motivated’ to recommend the culture to others.