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  • May 10, 2012

    A year in the Intranet Leadership Forum

    Categorised under: Intranet Leadership Forum

    We are all under the pump these days to do more with less. Intranets are an integral part of successful organisations and are starting to get recognised more and more. While this is exciting (and long overdue!), it does often means more work than an intranet team can handle.

    A year in the Intranet Leadership Forum can be a great way to relieve the pressure and increase the success of your intranet. See what other organisations are doing is the first step. The Forum then goes beyond this to explore key topics (chosen by members) in greater depth.

    How it all works

    Regular half day workshops show you a warts and all view of other members intranets, and help you to understand what worked, what didn’t and why. (Don’t waste time reinventing the wheel!) We guarantee that a Forum member has already been there, done that, on whatever you are planning to deliver in 2012. There are three of these workshops per year.

    The annual intensive is a unique combination of future trends, practical techniques and the best thinking. Held over two days, the intensive provides unique thinking and inspiration to you. It also gives time for hands on techniques and group sessions, producing valuable take-aways.

    Some comments from recent workshops:

    “Excellent, good presentations, you know your topics”

    “Like the mix up of structure and activities”

    “Really useful, particularly like the sessions on developing policies”

    A year in one chapter

    The Intranet Leadership Forum has local chapters in Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne and Sydney. To give a sense of what’s covered, these are just some of the highlights from the Melbourne chapter over the last year:

    September 2011

    The 15th floor at Freshwater Place on Southbank, where Bridie from Parsons Brinckerhoff shared the three intranets used to support staff at PB. Since 2009 the team have been working to deliver a task based intranet, and of special interest was how well PB uses SharePoint teamsites to support teams. The templated approach was the envy of the group.

    December 2011

    Two members in Melbourne, Nadine from Guild and Josh from BUPA, are redesigning the policy section of their intranet. To help Nadine and Josh as a group we reviewed all of our existing policy pages, identifying the good, the bad and the ugly, and coming up with a checklist of the essentials for a policy page. A “6 up / 1 up” sketching technique was used to design new policy pages for intranets, identifying concrete ideas to make tangible improvements.

    February 2012

    Social intranets: everyone is talking about them, but in reality what does it mean for existing intranets? In the real world, teams are often locked into the existing technology and can’t whiz up a new intranet in a matter of months. We therefore explored practical ideas on how to add social elements to an existing intranet in a culturally appropriate way. Some of the winners where commenting on news, one staff directory and making the intranet the go to place in the digital world within our workplace.

    April 2012

    The two day intensive, covering many different topics. One highlight was launching an intranet. The teams at Australia Post, Medibank and Melbourne Water are launching new intranets this year, and we explored the three phases of launching an intranet (pre, launch and post). Launch ideas from around the world were explored, focusing on approaches that didn’t take a lot of money and delivered high impact.

    Learn more

    The Intranet Leadership Forum provides the support structure to help intranet teams succeed at delivering great sites. Make use of spare funds at the end of the financial year, and benefit for the whole of the year to come.

    For more information on the Intranet Leadership Forum:

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  • May 8, 2012

    Field research is vital when designing enterprise mobile solutions

    Categorised under: Digital workplace, Enterprise 2.0, Intranets, Mobile

    MobileContext.jpg

    Diagram created by Giant Ant

    For many years now, we’ve highlighted the importance of understanding staff needs when designing or redesigning an intranet. This needs to be structured research (as outlined in the article Conducting intranet needs analysis), going beyond just “asking staff what they want”.

    When it comes to enterprise mobile solutions, it’s doubly important to conduct this type of research, for one simple reason: the context of use. As shown in the lovely diagram above (courtesy of Giant Ant), using a mobile is not like sitting at a desk.

    The environment that staff are in becomes paramount, and interactions with mobile devices become part of wider activities. There are many obvious examples:

    • Can the screen be clearly seen when used outdoors in bright sunlight?
    • Can the on-screen elements be easily pressed when wearing gloves in sub-zero temperatures?
    • Is there an ergonomic way of using the device for long periods?
    • Does the mobile solution actually match the sequence of work done in the field?
    • Which tasks make most sense on a mobile, and which should be left as manual or paper processes?

    To answer these questions, field research must be conducted at the outset of any project, before strategy, scoping and design. This should emphasise “ethnographic” research techniques, such as workplace observation and contextual inquiry, over narrower techniques such as interviews or usability testing.

    As we’ve often said, “you can’t design effective solutions for staff you haven’t personally met”. This is never more the can than for mobile solutions.

    We’ve done heaps of this over the years as part of our client work at Step Two. Spending time in the field always throws up surprises, and uncovers issues and needs invisible to head office. It’s also tremendously inspiring, reminding all involved that there are real staff who are struggling today, often to do the most basic of tasks. And simple solutions can often make a big difference, particularly in the mobile space.

    So it’s time to get out from behind the desk, and into the field!

    (For a deeper dive into enterprise mobility, sign up for my new workshop, The enterprise mobile revolution, being held in Sydney on July 17.)

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  • May 7, 2012

    How Intranets2012 will help your current intranet project

    Categorised under: Conferences & presentations

    It’s now just one week until Intranets2012 in Sydney. While everyone is keen to attend, we know it can be hard to get out of the office, particularly in the middle of a big intranet project.

    Intranets2012 will, however, help your current project to succeed (and to succeed in big way!). This are just a few reasons for making time, even in a busy schedule:

    • Steal design ideas from other projects. With a pile of real-world case studies across a range of technology platforms, there will be heaps of screenshots to get ideas from. (We’ve included a pile of 20min fast-paced slots specifically to showcase more sites.)
    • Avoid others’ mistakes. Intranet projects are complex, and it’s not too late to tweak approaches even mid-stream, based on lessons learnt from other projects.
    • Get answers to burning questions. With 100+ intranet professionals in the room, this is a great chance to get further input on the topics that have the team (and stakeholders) stuck.
    • Hunt down resources that can be reused. By swapping business cards and making connections, intranet teams can make friends that will often be happy to share the work they’ve already done, saving hours or days of effort.
    • Launch with a bang. Several of the talks will be specifically exploring how to launch (or relaunch) an intranet to get the greatest impact.

    Six steps to get the most from Intranets2012

    Follow these simple steps to get the greatest benefits from the conference:

    1. Write down a list of questions you want answered. Also include a list of screenshots and design elements you want to see and explore.
    2. Pick the talks that match your needs. With two streams of talks, there’s plenty to choose from, whether day-to-day practicalities or future thinking.
    3. Approach the speakers after their talks. And ask more in-depth questions that relate to your specific circumstances. (We have friendly speakers, who love to chat.)
    4. Seek out fellow participants who can help. Use your questions as discussion-starters during the breaks, and at the social event.
    5. Make connections. By meeting other teams, you can follow up interesting discussions after the conference to help solve your project challenges.
    6. Register for a post-conference workshop. These drill down into key topics, such as intranet design and governance, giving you practical techniques and outcomes that you can apply immediately.

    Register now to help your intranet project run smoothly and successfully.

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  • May 4, 2012

    Intranets2012: more about our international speakers

    Categorised under: Conferences & presentations

    When we put out the Intranets2012 call for papers late last year, we were flooded with great submissions, many from overseas. With the keynote slots quickly filled, that still left us with some superb speakers on the list. While it costs a pile to fly folks in from overseas, we just had to make it happen.

    So this year, we’ve got international speakers throughout the conference, not just as keynotes. And make no mistake, they haven’t been invited because they work for some high-profile company you’ve heard of. We’ve included them in the conference because they’re all super-smart and have important ideas to share.

    This could be the only chance you’ll get to see these folks in Australia, and don’t forget that it’s just over a week until the conference, so register now.

    Deane Barker (USA)

    Deane Barker is best known for his contributions to the high-profile Gadgetopia blog, which covers a wide range of thinking in the content management space. He’s also being doing some really interesting intranet projects in his role at Blend Interactive, a web strategy, design and development firm in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

    Join Deane on day 1 of conference, when he reveals the results of a study on the fear of social intranets, what causes it, and what you can do about it in order to open up your intranet to social transformation. Learn why decision makers in the enterprise are often afraid of the social interaction on their intranet for reasons they can’t or won’t acknowledge (to you, or even to themselves).

    Maish Nichani (Singapore)

    Maish is one of the most respected intranet and UX folks in Singapore (and beyond). He shot to fame when he published not one but two extraordinary eBooks (both free): Manager’s guidebook on intranet redesign projects and Organizing digital information for others. He also has a long track record of interesting work for Singapore government agencies.

    Join Maish on day 2 to explore “service design” and what it means for intranets. His talk will show how principles and methods from this emerging discipline can be applied to discover new services or fix existing ones, all with the aim of helping staff get their jobs done in a faster, smarter way.

    Dion Hinchcliffe (USA)

    If you haven’t heard of Dion, you should. He is an internationally recognised thought leader, and author of the just-released book Social Business By Design. Dion has been blogging for a very long time, sharing his insights into enterprise 2.0 and social business. (His diagrams alone are guaranteed to get you thinking!)

    Join Dion on day 1, when he explores how to drive better business outcomes on the corporate intranet, via social approaches. The session will look at companies and intranet implementations that have significant impact to the bottom line or have otherwise been particularly transformative.

    Plus more

    … and these are just three of our international speakers. They’ll be joined at the conference by William Amurgis (USA), Martin White (UK), Michael Sampson (New Zealand), Rachel McAlpine (New Zealand) and Dorje McKinnon (New Zealand). See you at Intranets2012!

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  • May 2, 2012

    Introducing this year’s guest judge for the Intranet Innovation Awards

    Categorised under: intranet innovation awards

    This year’s Intranet Innovation Awards opened for entries last week, and organisations have until May 31 to get their great ideas in. We’re looking forward to all sorts of exciting enterprise solutions and approaches, particularly around social and mobile.

    In recent years, we’ve invited a “practitioner judge” to join our permanent panel of intranet experts in reviewing the entries. This “keeps it real”, and injects a fresh perspective that adds richness to the process.

    I’m pleased to announce that this year’s practitioner judge is Christy Season Punch, the senior intranet strategist at SCANA Corporation in the US. Christy is well known in the Twitterverse (@ChristySeason), and she manages an intranet that reaches almost 10,000 employees and contractors.

    Christy was the project lead and strategist for a complete redesign of SCANA’s intranet using SharePoint 2010. She also serves on a social media committee at SCANA that develops strategies for using social media internally and externally.

    A warm welcome to Christy, we’re excited to have you on board!

    1 comment »

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