Can a Personalised Intranet Add Value To Your Organisation?

Imagine if you could transform your intranet into a person; someone who is likeable, you trust and who is imbued with knowledge - how would you respond? Would you work harder? Be more productive?

Yes.

As workers we are naturally attracted to employers who make the effort to greet us personally; who will put in the time to mentor, guide and advise us by providing the necessary information we need to do our jobs.

In an environment where we are valued and engaged, we work harder to show our gratitude…

Can these skills be applied to intranets?

The best intranets act like a person, and by doing so have the power to boost productivity; strengthen employee performance and ultimately create an innovative workforce that engages and is receptive to change.

According to the Chartered Institute of Marketing, 93% of respondents believe a strong intranet fosters better innovation, and it is true. By improving the usability of the intranet; adding transactional processes and offering every employee personalised pages dedicated to their individual development; it is possible to align them to your workflow practices and boost productivity.

However, if you’re still not convinced of the benefits of personalised intranets. Take a look below.

What is the purpose of the intranet?

The goal behind every intranet is to serve its users by boosting consumer knowledge and showcasing the products, services and ultimately the objectives of an organisation. At the same time, it should aim to enhance/streamline working practices.

A good intranet aims to:

• Establish an environment which clearly reflects an employees’ business, role, location and interest.
• Help employees with their job and long term development by providing practice activities and tools.
• Help users to quickly locate content thanks to its intuitive navigational tools and layout.
• Encourage collaboration across departments/groups through coordinated activities.
• Create a unified identity.
• Sustain quality and usability through training and an awareness of content governance.
• Ensure users benefit from a consistent, high-quality user experience.
• Improve intranet standards by regularly evaluating performance and promoting best practices.
• Remain inclusive to all employees.

User expectations are constantly evolving. They expect to be able to interact and collaborate at a business level. Pair this with technology, and both have the power to control how intranet interfaces work and the way they are structured.

For this reason, every good company should aim to turn their intranet into a source of knowledge that is able to predict employee desires and give them what they want, whilst at the same time is capable of boosting employee productivity.

By balancing the communication objectives of your business against the needs of your users, you can effectively highlight your working practices, and benefit from a number of long term strategic advantages.

Understanding the journey of your users

During the planning phase of your intranet project, it is important to employ Information Architecture techniques – site maps, wireframe, user testing/journeys and prototyping – to test the functionality and features of your intranet to make sure it works to maximum efficiency.

Quite often existing user journeys are utilised to help examine user journeys and the way they interact with the intranet, so they can inform the core features and functionality of the site.

Take the following user journey:

Example user journey: Andrew uses the intranet for the first time Andrew is 22, and originally from Nottingham where he went to university. He has moved to Bristol to take up a position within the Sales & Marketing team at ACME Ltd. He has left his friends and family behind and is renting a flat in the centre of the city so that he can meet people and make new friends.

Whilst studying at university, he gained a good level of competency and confidence with ICT. He regularly uses the internet in internet cafes and emails his friends and family back home in Nottingham to keep them up-to-date with his new life.

He is a huge Nottingham Forest Football Club fan and gets the latest news from fan blogs, official e-newsletters and RSS feeds.

Andrew has only been with the company for a month and has no previous commercial experience. He feels intimidated by the working environment and is uncertain of his roles and responsibilities. He doesn’t want to ask for help because he is concerned that his lack of understanding will reflect badly on him.

He has a good knowledge of technology but lacks confidence and experience of ACME Ltd.’s systems and terminology. He is learning about company structure, policies and procedures and how they apply to him.

This is his first visit to the intranet.

* He arrives on the intranet homepage He’s not logged in but can select a predefined profile that matches his needs (i.e. “New to ACME”)

* He selects a predefined profile for the homepage - The information and applications on the homepage tell him all he needs to know as a new starter

* He follows a link to a Flash-based interactive e-learning module on the HR area of the intranet

The module provides good insight into ACME Ltd. He can see downloads, contacts, signposts and links

* He follows a link to his business sector homepage - The page has information added by his business sector and content posted by employees in his sector

* He follows a link to content posted by a colleague who works for the same business sector in ACME Ltd The post is about a local five-a-side football tournament. He can comment or contact his colleague. He contacts his colleague and arranges to meet in the canteen to discuss the tournament.

* Andrew has learned more about how ACME Ltd operate and has made a connection with a colleague.

Features and functionality

As I’ve mentioned before – understanding a users’ journey can go a long way to helping you identify key features and where to improve functionality, especially during the planning phase.

From here you will be able to compile a list of all your final features, before hosting workshops/inviting key stakeholders to help identify the highest priorities of both yourself (your business) and your prospective audience.

Common features and functionalities you should expect include:

• Web specific content information – this can be content that is specific to business sectors, departments (HR, Sales etc.), a country, news, a particular event, products/services, locations, contacts or even content that has been supplied by existing employees through social media networks.
• Internal links and graphical signposts – these are an asset to every marketing plan as they guide users from their current viewing page to others sources of relevant information (either on the website or elsewhere on the intranet).
• Content tools – offering users the opportunity to print, email pages/links or view the intranet via their mobile is invaluable for bolstering user engagement.
• Multilingual content – not every user who comes across content on your intranet will speak English, so it essential that from the start they have the option to specify their preferred language and are able to view your content in their chosen language.
• Feeds and alerts – email, RSS or mobile, your intranet should easily be able to send users new information based on their profile details.
• Contact information – a searchable directory containing all your employees’ details/personalised profiles can make it easier for employees to connect as they’ll immediately be able to see their job role and titles, their photos and even their business cards.
• Location information – similar to contact information, this should be a searchable directory, containing all business locations, names, addresses and links to a map.
• User registration – non-registered users should still be given access to relevant content tools to assist their search. From quick-link menus to country selectors, they should be able to browse efficiently. For registered users, they should have access to a larger selection of tools and content, including update subscriptions, content preferences and the ability to add; post comments and content onto community pages; delete, and rearrange the appearance of their home page.
• Social media – ranging from tools to content, users should be able to offer their own contributions as well as have the resources to personalise their content.
• Application access – using either quick links or direct access, users should be able to utilise business applications and access data from the intranets HR systems, calendars and booking facilities.
• Housekeeping site search – this contains links to the intranets site map, legal policies, contacts, other sites and support network.

Define your requirements and benefit objectives

At this stage it is important to clearly outline your objectives and requirements, so you can ascertain your communication benefits. These include being able to support business changes and the delivery of global communication campaigns, but also:

• Cross department engagement - where teams are able to openly collaborate and voice their suggestions during discussion forums.
• Strengthened employee engagement - which is easily achieved by retaining staff and increasing employee satisfaction.
• Consistent designs – no matter the platform or where users are accessing the intranet from, all pages should have the same look and feel.
• One location – make sure all key messages are accessible from one single location to prevent confusion or delays in communication.
• Improve operational efficiency and reduce costs/expenditures.

Get your employees involved

At the end of the day it is your employees who will be using your intranet, so give them a voice and allow them to help define how it works, looks and feels. By relegating this to ambassadors they can help roll-out and encourage employee engagement, so you can receive the feedback you need to ensure continuous improvement.