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Unlocking the Value of HP’s Employee PortalBy Peter Eschbach and Jeremy MorganThe merger between HP and Compaq brought together more than 88,000 employees across 178 countries, and at its peak HP would employ more than 140,000 employees. To improve information management and strengthen communications among its employees, HP developed “@hp,” a business-to-employee (B2E) intranet portal that provided a gateway to the merged Compaq and HP legacy intranets. The portal provides employees with a personalized gateway to one of the world’s largest intranets, combining countless streams of information and access to hundreds of applications and services. Before the merger, both companies had embraced the potential of their intranets to promote collaboration and knowledge sharing, allowing intranet “ecosystems” to develop organically, and online “communities of interest” to flourish and grow independently of each other. As a result, vibrant, often chaotic online environments evolved that contained vast pools of institutional knowledge, ideas, expertise and applications. This unmanaged growth, however, came at a cost: while millions of pages were available to employees, a lack of standards made it hard to access information. Thus, when HP and Compaq merged, the potential of a new, combined intranet as a tool for harmonizing the operations and culture of the two companies was potentially compromised. Millions of pages of valuable information – and new content relating to the merger – were in effect inaccessible to employees. The new company’s workforce comprised employees, managers, functional leaders (e.g., HR and IT managers) and company executives located in offices, home offices, distribution centers and manufacturing facilities. Many were hundreds of miles away from corporate facilities, working from home or on the road, their laptop computers representing their primary lifeline to the company. This online dependence made having a well-organized, easy-to-navigate and clearly understood intranet critical to HP employee satisfaction and business success. To complicate the task ahead of Porter Novelli, the launch of this major new internal product was without precedent: No infrastructure existed to facilitate the simultaneous communication of messages to 88,000-plus employees in multiple languages and geographies. Setting GoalsHP and Porter Novelli recognized that employees would only embrace the intranet if they were aware of and understood the value of the content available through the portal. The communications team therefore needed to both raise awareness of the potential of the intranet, and educate employees to ensure that they knew how it could save them time and make their lives easier. An ongoing communication program launched after the merger would support the evolution of HP’s intranet as more tools, functionality and information were added to it over time.Second, as the intranet evolved, Porter Novelli’s interactive team and HP would work together to ensure that its design contributed to the achievement of several critical organizational and cultural goals. The StrategyTo meet these goals, HP and Porter Novelli worked together to establish an internal communications infrastructure within which Porter Novelli designed and executed a targeted, carefully messaged communications plan to accompany major intranet innovations, from the global roll-out of new business measurement and reporting tools to user interface redesigns.In addition, Porter Novelli’s interactive team would support HP through a home page redesign that better aligned the portal with corporate goals. In addition to making @hp more attractive and engaging, which would promote employee adoption, Porter Novelli redesigned the portal to make the navigation of the page simpler and more intuitive, ultimately reducing the number of clicks employees have to make before reaching the information they need. In addition, a shared sense of community would be critical to the integration of the two organizations: the home page should embody and propagate elements of the new corporate culture, while also promoting the numerous professional and personal communities of interest to be found within the new company. Execution: Positioning @hpThe two companies worked together to establish an internal communications infrastructure that harmonized intranet-related messaging and coordinated employee outreach to ensure that communications were delivered at the right time to the right internal audiences. Frequently, communications relating to new applications or tools would be delivered to specific internal groups – managers, for example, or the finance team – who would be “champions” for new initiatives, disseminating information to secondary audiences.Porter Novelli designed and executed a targeted, carefully-messaged communications plan to accompany major intranet innovations, from the global roll-out of new business measurement and reporting tools to user-interface redesigns. A detailed weekly and monthly communications calendar, alongside comprehensive communications plans for each territory and messaging platforms endorsed at the highest levels, ensured that HP maximized the impact of its intranet-related communications, delivering resonant messages to well-defined audiences at the optimum time. The program comprised a blend of carefully crafted online and offline tactics, including interactive demos to support new service launches, brochures, posters, executive e-mails and voicemails, downloadable manager presentations and online seminars. The Porter Novelli team also developed a number of Flash e-cards as a creative solution to the problem of reaching one of the most geographically dispersed workforces in the world. Porter Novelli also ensured that, where appropriate, communications materials were translated into the company’s official languages: Chinese (simplified and traditional), English, French, French-Canadian, German, Korean, Japanese and Spanish. @hp redesignIt was particularly important that the design of the @hp home page represent the breadth of content and functionality available in the broader intranet, yet maintain a look and feel that protected users from being overwhelmed by information. In 2005, Porter Novelli worked with HP to execute a far-reaching redesign project.“Much time was spent working with HP’s internal communications teams its IT group to make sure that there was an appropriate balance between aesthetic execution and the strategic imperatives that were outlined at the beginning of the project,” said Marcos Rivera, vice president of interactive services at Porter Novelli. Porter Novelli provided a design that was a variation of the “One Voice” standards selected by the @hp team as the design direction for the entire portal. Porter Novelli worked closely with the development team at HP to make sure that all of the nuances of the design were represented in the execution of the home page development. Recognizing that the adoption of a new intranet page required enormous behavioral change throughout the program, Porter Novelli also executed an extensive communications plan to support the launch, including tiered communications and a full suite of online and offline initiatives designed to reassure and educate employees as to the necessity and rectitude of the transformation. Research and MeasurementRegular research initiatives, developed and executed by Porter Novelli in partnership with HP, have been key to the success of the program. Employee surveys – conducted via email or through links on relevant intranet pages – have served three main purposes:
Ultimately, this ensured that the intranet was the first place employees would go in order to learn about corporate performance and strategy, corporate and social responsibility programs, sales data and the latest product information. Lessons LearnedAn intranet can be a powerful tool, particularly for companies whose workforces are distributed across multiple facilities, geographies or time zones. Offering 24/7 availability of information and a consistent platform for the delivery of key company information and applications, a well-designed employee portal can simplify workflow, improve productivity and facilitate the sharing of knowledge and best practices. At least, it can if employees use it.-- Peter Eschbach is a senior vice president at Porter Novelli. Jeremy Morgan is an account manager at the agency.
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