Because it is a department connected to every part of an organisation, Human Resources (HR) has a unique position that can be leveraged to help underpin the intranet's value to staff. HR remains a key stakeholder of, and publisher to, the corporate intranet. Reviewing the various content and tasks available can ...
Monthly Archives: August 2010
August 31, 2010
Three elements of every intranet strategy
Intranet strategies vary from 100-page formal documents to informal plans that can be conveyed verbally in a lift. Some strategies cover the coming six months, while others stretch out to encompass five-year timescales. Regardless of the scope and duration of the plans, successful strategies all build on a common narrative structure ...
Categorised under: Intranets, James' articles
Tags: intranet strategy, Intranets, strategy
August 31, 2010
Putting people at the centre: social staff directories
The term 'social intranet' has become popular in recent times, and describes an intranet with social media tools -- blogs, wikis, microblogs, comment functionality and more -- embedded within the core intranet software platform. However, before a social intranet can be successful, work must be done to enrich and develop ...
Categorised under: Enterprise 2.0, Intranets
Tags: Enterprise 2.0, Intranets, social intranets, staff directories
August 28, 2010
Stopping re-posting articles?
For many, many years now I've used this blog to repost interesting and useful articles from across the web. 3,439 posts later, I've built up a large stock of valuable information. But the nature of the web is ever-changing, and so it's time to revisit the purpose of the blog. With ...
Categorised under: James' articles
August 22, 2010
Returning to Europe in October with two days free
I'm pleased to say that I'll be back in Europe in October, to present at IntraTeam events in Sweden and Denmark, including running my two-day intranet masterclass. For details: International events calendar I'll also be doing some consulting in the UK, leaving me two free days: Monday October 11 and Tuesday ...
Categorised under: Conferences & presentations
August 19, 2010
How did intranet homepages become so static?
Something strange has happened to intranet homepages. Despite the diversity of staff needs and activities, intranets have ended up with a fixed, static and unreactive homepage that only targets generic requirements. Having fought so hard to balance competing stakeholder demands, intranet ...
Categorised under: Enterprise 2.0, Intranets, Usability & user-centered design
August 16, 2010
Intranet vs enterprise 2.0 vs social software: an obvious case of terminological controversy
Denis Zenkin discusses the confusion between intranets and enterprise 2.0. To quote: Intranet is basically a practical tool that creates a unified workplace for an organization supplying a number of benefits. In my opinion, the list of must-have features include collaboration, communications and knowledge base. I agree with Denis on this ...
Categorised under: Enterprise 2.0, Intranets
Tags: Enterprise 2.0, Intranets, social intranets
August 12, 2010
Discussing the length of the intranet homepage
Some while back I posted an article which asked the question: how long should the intranet homepage be? I then discused what attractive intranets look like, providing examples of modern designs, including some long homepages. This generated some discussion and debate. Most recently, it has led Toby Ward to ...
Categorised under: Intranets, Usability & user-centered design
August 10, 2010
To technology strategists: how to blend enterprise + business + people?
Jane McConnell has written an insightful piece on balancing three perspectives of intranets. To quote: When I work with global organizations to help them define the business objectives of the intranet, we do it from these 3 angles. The problem is when we push each dimension to its logical conclusion, ...
Categorised under: Collaboration, Enterprise 2.0, Intranets
Tags: Collaboration, communications, Enterprise 2.0, Intranets
August 9, 2010
The intranet: communication portal or employee toolkit?
Christopher Swan writes about intranets becoming more than just a communications portal. To quote: Over the last year or so, I’ve seen a quiet war waging between communicators and employees. Communicators passionately want to share breaking news, org changes, evergreen stories and the not so timely letter from the ...
Categorised under: Intranets
Tags: communications, Intranets
August 9, 2010
Free-for-all intranets – how to discern the ‘correct’ info
Wedge asks how staff can discern the right information on intranets, when there's a free-for-all publishing approach. To quote: Information overload is a real risk if your strategy is to allow anyone / everyone to publish pages, documents, wikis and blogs on your intranet. And our modern, powerful search engines ...
Categorised under: Intranets
Tags: Intranets
August 5, 2010
Card sorting beauty shots
Writing a book is a funny process. When putting the final touches to Designing intranets: creating sites that work, I found myself taking beauty shots of card sorting cards: These are far ...
Categorised under: Intranets, Usability & user-centered design
Tags: book, card sorting, Photos
August 3, 2010
Pre-order your copy of Designing intranets: creating sites that work
Followers of our blog posts and tweats would be aware that I've been working on our next book. Called Designing intranets: creating sites that work, this is the definitive textbook for teams tasked with designing a new intranet, or redesigning an existing site. In 275 pages, this book ...
Categorised under: Intranets, Usability & user-centered design
August 3, 2010
5 key features to consider when choosing a social intranet
Angela Cullen lists key features to consider when choosing a social intranet. To quote: By using a forum or threaded discussion tool, you can engage your employees around specific topics and challenge them to start talking about topics that matter to them. For instance, Project Managers might discuss the ...
Categorised under: Collaboration, Enterprise 2.0, Intranets
Tags: Intranets, social intranet
August 3, 2010
IBF 24: AEP live tour
IBF are progressively releasing copies of sessions from their IBF 24 online event, and the next is the AEP live tour. To quote: In this video William Amurgis, Internal Communications Manager at AEP, gives a live tour of their intranet and a sneak preview of their new intranet design. (William is ...
Categorised under: Intranets
Tags: Intranets
August 2, 2010
Making the case for enterprise activity streams
Christopher Lynch discusses the value of activity streams on intranets and in collaboration tools. To quote: From a purely practical standpoint, various activity streams, and social software in general, are extra tools layered on top of the current systems a worker has in place. This is inherently true because we’re not ...
Categorised under: Collaboration, Enterprise 2.0, Intranets
Tags: Enterprise 2.0, social tools
