[Editor’s Note: This is the first of a two-part series about constructing an intranet, one of the hottest topics in internal communications. Part 2 will appear in next week’s edition.]
Those outside the corporate world can be blissfully unaware of how unwieldy a corporation can be, especially when it comes to getting new initiatives implemented and everyone on board, paddling in the same direction.
But effecting change across large organizations is more often like slaloming the Titanic through a gantlet of icebergs. The lurking danger, just under the surface, is lack of communication.
This is why we have seen an evolution during the past 10 years toward seamless intranets that integrate into workers’ day-to-day activity. It’s about communication, getting every single member of the organization to lean left, then right, in concert.
Organizations are changing. Communication is no longer as simple as us (employees) versus them (the public). Today, brands need internal PR to speak with contractors, vendors, equity and commercial partners, board members, franchisees and other stakeholders.
A recent assignment tasked us to develop and launch a complex, multi-pronged internal communications portal for an automotive aftermarket-franchising client using Jive, a proprietary software. The client is a conglomeration of 10 brands, each with a distinct business model and footprint across North America. The intranet was to focus not just on employees but networks of franchisees and store-level managerial constituents. The threads weave together to form complex permutations of different user roles, permissions, communication types and requirements. By necessity, these platforms must take fragmented needs and coalesce them, becoming all things to all people.
Don’t worry—it’s only half as daunting as it sounds. Here’s how you do it.
Starting out: ‘Let’s Talk’
Begin by convening a strategy session with the brand’s decision makers. Outline areas for potential improvement and how to get there. Most legacy intranets are inadequate for today’s communication needs. People will eagerly discuss pain points; mobility often is the top complaint. In addition, brands often fail to realize they need a new solution.
In the case I’m writing about the client understood this. Communications flow had been slowed by the daily grind of emails, hand coding HTML and list updates. There was no one-stop shop or central repository for institutional knowledge.
A good strategy session should begin with a comprehensive appraisal of the current internal communications regime. Show examples of communication that has worked and that has failed. Mostly, you’ll need to ask tough questions [please see sidebar]. The most important, as in many PR activities, is which KPIs will define success?
You should emerge from a good strategy session with a realistic understanding of the size and shape of your current internal communications regime.
Questions To Ask During an Initial intranet Strategy Session
▪What does each stakeholder group need to know? What helps its members do their jobs?
▪How do these individuals get information? It is via email, meetings, conference calls or a combination?
▪What types of digital devices do the stakeholders use? How comfortable are they in digital environments?
▪Are they near other media, such as screens or monitors that could potentially be used to deliver key messaging?
Later, during use case sessions, ask some of these questions:
▪How should users be grouped? Hierarchically? Regionally? By department or job function? This is the first piece of architecture for your new intranet.
▪When and where will each user group interact with the new intranet? Can you force their browser homepages to show the intranet or are you limited to mobile and email?
▪On what cadence does your business require employees to be updated? Daily? Weekly? Monthly? Use this to build out a standing editorial calendar. Make sure to include emergency situations, however.
Use Cases and Content Owners
After digesting the findings of your strategy session, it’s time to build out use cases—detailed scenarios that lay out how every user will interact ideally with a new system.
Much of the use case will boil down to the brand’s internal communications process. From authorship to ownership to oversight, you must lay out an editorial/content plan that will be easy to adhere to, something flexible and scalable.
Identify a content owner for each department, brand or discipline. That individual should act as a liaison, funneling content for publication to the communications team. Content owners should know when the content goes up and when it should be scheduled to come down. Publishing life is very important for intranets, as most items become outdated or overwritten within a few weeks or months. You wouldn’t want an employee searching for the latest 401(k) fund information to stumble across a version from 10 years ago, would you?
From there, a community manager should route the communication through any necessary approval channels. Practically, this is best done by loading the communication into the content management system and saving it as a draft. This helps keep edits neat and tidy and ensures version control. Send the draft URL to pertinent department leaders, legal and anyone else you trust to lend insight. (Some systems like WordPress and Jive allow you to establish a moderation queue that automatically notifies people on the approval chain.) Begin this process two weeks before the community launches to get the approval teams ready for their new workflow.
A warning: Keep this circle tight. Too many chefs can ruin the soup. We all know that person who needs to weigh in with unnecessary feedback—a pathological compulsion that stems from a need to appear to be doing something. Don’t include that person in your approval trust circle.
CONTACT: Davidq@rockorange