Best Practice Guide for Improving Your Hourly Worker Employee Experience 

Hourly workers represent over 80% of the global workforce, serving in industries like healthcare, hospitality, and retail. Yet, they’re often left behind when it comes to workplace technology, communication, and support. With turnover rates for these roles hovering around 100% annually, it’s clear that something’s broken. 

Creating a “sticky” employee experience, or one that retains hourly workers and improves their day-to-day experience, means solving real problems with meaningful, accessible, and intuitive solutions. This guide unpacks actionable best practices across four key areas: financial empowerment, flexibility, communication, and engagement, to improve your hourly worker experience in a way that matters to them. 

Understand the Needs of Your Hourly Workers 

Hourly workers are not a one-size-fits-all group. If you really want them to “stick” and have an empowered, connected workplace experience, there are distinct pain points to address first. For this guide, we’ll focus on those concerns relating to: 

1. Seasonal Workers: Often younger, gig-style workers who value quick access to pay, flexible schedules, and mobile communication. 

2. Full-Time Hourly Workers: Core staff across industries who need reliable schedules, clear communication, and advancement opportunities. 

3. Insured Hourly Workers: Typically eligible for benefits and more likely to stick around if they feel valued and supported. 

Further reading: Top 5 Reasons Why Hourly Workers Leave Their Jobs 

1. Financial Empowerment 

Give your teams the tools and resources they need to take charge of their finances. When they’re empowered with knowledge and control of their earnings, they’ll have less anxiety about their money. And they’ll be more likely to stay with a company that provides the tools and access they need. 

The Common Problem: Hourly workers often live paycheck to paycheck, creating stress and disengagement that drives turnover. 

Actionable Steps: 

• Implement Earned Wage Access so employees can access earned pay before payday. 

• Pair EWA with financial education content (videos, PDFs, app notifications) to further facilitate a financially empowered workforce. 

• Provide access to paycheck history and tax documents on mobile. 

Pro Tip: Make sure access to these tools is mobile-first. Hourly workers are more likely to use phones over desktops. 

The Netchex Solution: Offer on-demand pay options through Earned Wage Access (EWA) and financial wellness resources.  

2. Scheduling & Role Management 

Nothing frustrates an hourly worker more than not knowing the upcoming week’s schedule, where they’re supposed to report to, and dealing with timecard mistakes. Imagine the compounded frustration when they’re faced with a PDF or digital screenshot of their schedule, making it nearly impossible to make changes. Further, when it’s complicated to just do their job, they’ll quickly be on the hunt for a new job. 

The Common Problem: Juggling changing roles, shift swaps, and last-minute scheduling needs leads to frustration and miscommunication. 

Actionable Steps: 

• Post the schedule early. 

• Automate communication around any schedule changes so employees are not caught by surprise. 

• Allow employees to swap shifts digitally with manager approval. 

• Allow employees to share their availability with managers so they are not being scheduled when they are not available and having to later adjust. 

• Accurately control overtime spend with accurate scheduling and real-time alerts for schedule violations.   

Pro Tip: Introduce proactive scheduling for consistent shifts, which boosts retention and compliance. 

The Netchex Solution: The Netchex user-friendly Schedule builder allows for dynamic, real-time scheduling, shift-swaps, and smart workflow management.   

3. Access & Communication 

Your hourly workers want to be in the know. They might feel like they don’t know where to go to stay informed, and HR may not work in the same building, or the same schedule that they work. It can be a burden for them to ask about things like time off, benefits, or company policies.   

The Common Problem: Hourly workers need support when and where they are. Legacy systems built for traditional desked employees (usually in the office) lead to confusion and delays for those working outside of an office. 

Actionable Steps: 

• Offer digital support that’s available 24/7 and offers consistency in responses to ensure every worker knows the correct policies and procedures. 

• Push updates and alerts to employees via SMS or app notifications. 

• Let employees check timecards, schedules, and pay history without logging in to a desktop. 

• Enable missed punches and punch requests through a self-service app. 

Pro Tip: Provide language options within your app to support non-native English speakers. 

The Netchex Solution: Centralized access to the tools your employees need, like ASK HR, in an easy-to-use, mobile responsive, self-service platform that’s available 24/7—even when you aren’t working. 

4. Engagement & Culture 

Because most hourly workers perform their tasks outside of an office environment, they can feel disconnected from the company. If they don’t feel like they’re part of the team culture, missing out on in-office conversations and on-site access to perks and information, they’re more likely to change jobs in search of a more connected workplace experience.  

The Common Problem: Disconnected workers feel replaceable. Without a sense of belonging, performance and retention suffer. 

Actionable Steps: 

• Automate birthday, anniversary, and milestone shoutouts in your system. 

• Use surveys to collect feedback monthly, then act on it visibly. 

• Create employee goals that align with organizational objectives to give employees a sense of purpose 

• Create a culture of recognition with real-time kudos and peer-to-peer feedback 

• Provide structured feedback to employees with a streamlined performance management process. 

Pro Tip: Show the “why” behind tasks. Purpose builds connections and reduces turnover. 

The Netchex Solution: Keep your teams connected with personalized shout-outs and celebrations, directly in the Employee Engagement Portal. Kudos and convos, birthdays, and milestones, this is your space to spark morale with just a few clicks. 

5. Training Hourly Workers & Supporting Growth 

According to Forbes, 71% of all hourly workers express deep interest in developing new skills. And 45% of workers say they’re more likely to stay in their current roles if more training opportunities were available to them. This reinforces the importance of upskilling and training for hourly workers. 

The Common Problem: Hourly workers are often undertrained or onboarded inconsistently, leading to avoidable errors and lost productivity. 

Actionable Steps: 

• Automatically assign training to new hires to ensure consistency. 

• Use mobile-friendly training platforms to deliver microlearning modules. 

• Include video walkthroughs and scenario-based training. 

• Track completion and send nudges for overdue tasks. 

• Offer peer mentoring or buddy systems for new hires. 

Pro Tip: Ask new hires for feedback on the training program after two weeks and 30 days. Use it to improve your onboarding and training continuously. 

The Netchex Solution: Offer training that fits the hourly lifestyle with our Learning Management software. Leverage our course library or build your own courses to close skills gaps, get new hires up to speed faster, and provide consistent online education. 

Netchex Has Your Back (Along with Your Payroll & HR) 

A sticky employee experience for hourly workers doesn’t just happen. It’s built from the ground up with responsive tools, real-time access, and a culture that meets employees where they are. 

From EWA to self-service scheduling to pulse surveys and shoutouts, every detail matters. What’s good for your hourly team is great for your bottom line: lower turnover, higher productivity, and a workplace where people want to stay. 

Let’s make work easier, more intuitive, and more human, starting with the people who make your business run every day. Explore all the available features that make your employee experiences stickier and help improve your hourly worker retention in a big way.