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How enterprises can use a PLG mindset to improve employee experience

Article 23 Dec 2024 Read time: 1 min

By Ismail Amla, Senior Vice President of Kyndryl Consult

Product-led growth (PLG) is often seen as a buzzword, but it’s rooted in a simple idea: build products that users love by deeply understanding their needs. While PLG is commonly associated with the development of customer-facing tools, it holds untapped potential for internal tools.

Enterprise technology leaders have an opportunity to drive meaningful change across the businesses they serve. By applying PLG principles to their internal systems, they can spearhead the transformation of clunky workflows into more intuitive experiences that enhance employee satisfaction and drive efficiency and growth.

The recipe is not rocket science. PLG begins with detailed behavioral analyses. This means going beyond surveys by using heatmaps, click-path tracking and user journey studies to pinpoint where employees encounter friction or abandon workflows. Combine these insights with metrics like task completion rates, time-to-task and feature engagement scores to understand what’s working and what needs improvement. Add in configurability and flexibility, which are essential in allowing employees to modify their workflows and customize tools to fit their needs. Prioritize seamless integrations between tools to eliminate clunky transitions and create a uniform look and feel. Together, these PLG practices can lead to much better internal tooling design and more productive workers.

Take the retail industry as an example. Leading brands over the last many years overhauled their internal systems for store associates, introducing intuitive apps that have replaced outdated systems for inventory management, scheduling and task tracking — many of them are now smartphone-based. These are tools that have improved over time, informed by PLG principles and behavioral analytics.

Unlike the rigid, siloed and manual systems of the past, today’s tools are easier to work with, scalable, cloud-based and, in many cases, designed to evolve with business needs.

Rethinking internal tools as products

With most user tools, striking a careful balance between functionality and usability is key to unlocking their full potential. Far too often, though, internal tools prioritize functionality, something that leads to poor adoption and user dissatisfaction. A PLG approach reframes employees as “customers” of internal products. Unlike traditional persona mapping and a few design iterations, effective PLG relies on deeper analytics, focusing on real user behavior to highlight friction points. Heatmaps reveal where users struggle, task success metrics identify bottlenecks and click-path tracking uncovers inefficiencies in workflows. These insights enable design teams to prioritize changes that have the greatest impact.

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Product-led growth is often seen as a buzzword, but it’s rooted in a simple idea: build products that users love by deeply understanding their needs.

Ismail Amla

Senior Vice President of Kyndryl Consult

Seamless integration: Bridging the tooling ecosystem PLG alignment

Table stakes for PLG is making integration invisible. For internal tools and SaaS configurations, seamless integration plays this role by eliminating bottlenecks and enabling smoother workflows. Unified access points, such as single sign-on (SSO), mimic the simplicity of consumer PLG products where users interact with features effortlessly. Federated search, which allows employees to retrieve information across multiple tools from a single query, creates a cohesive experience. Data interoperability ensures information flows seamlessly between tools, avoiding the need for redundant manual entry. This alignment with PLG principles reduces barriers to adoption and engagement, ensuring employees can interact with internal systems as smoothly as customers interact with user-friendly PLG products.

Iterative development and MVPs

PLG thrives on iterative development, where tools evolve based on continuous feedback. CIOs should treat internal tools as living products, launching minimum viable products (MVPs) with core features and refining them based on real-world usage data. For instance, a lightweight workflow automation tool can be deployed to a small team for initial testing, with feedback driving refinements to interfaces and features. PLG emphasizes regular, incremental updates informed by employee feedback. Behavioral data can be supplemented with user interviews to uncover frustrations and preferences. This agile approach prevents stagnation, ensures tools stay aligned with employee needs and feeds into building a culture of experimentation.

A culture of experimentation: Small risks, big rewards

Experimentation is a hallmark of PLG, where small, low-risk tests drive continuous improvements. Internal tooling can adopt this mindset by creating a safe space for testing new ideas. A/B testing, common in external PLG strategies, can be applied internally to evaluate different tool configurations or workflows. For example, CIOs can test two versions of a workflow to determine which one leads to higher task completion rates. Sandbox environments provide employees with a space to experiment with configurations without affecting production systems. Gamifying experimentation by rewarding feedback incentivizes employees to engage with tools and actively contribute to their improvement. These approaches echo PLG’s focus on experimentation as a path to innovation, ensuring internal tools continuously align with the evolving needs of their users.

Empowerment through usability

Internal tools designed with a PLG mindset can also empower employees to take control of their workflows. Self-service features like interactive guides and in-app walkthroughs reduce reliance on IT support. Contextual help — such as tooltips and embedded documentation — simplifies the learning curve, while customizable dashboards allow employees to tailor tools to their unique workflows. Empowered employees are more likely to adopt tools enthusiastically, increasing satisfaction and productivity. In addition, PLG puts a high value on regular employee feedback. Designers can supplement behavioral data with user interviews to uncover hidden frustrations not in the metrics.

PLG for driving engagement and satisfaction

By applying PLG principles to internal tools, CIOs can transform them into assets that drive engagement and satisfaction. Smarter data collection, iterative design, user empowerment and cross-functional collaboration ensure that internal tools evolve to meet the dynamic needs of employees. This not only boosts productivity but also creates a workplace where employees feel supported and engaged, reinforcing the CIO’s role as a driver of innovation and organizational success.