You’re a major consumer goods company that delivers products designed for the fashion elite, constantly at the leading edge.

You’re a global technology company, that attracts the brightest minds to deliver the most innovative solutions.

You’re a worldwide non-profit that attracts those who are looking to make the world a better place, drawing on great people to solve world hunger.

Yet in all four cases, your intranet is out-of-date, poorly designed, hard to use, under-resourced and non-functional.

What message does this send to your staff?

It says: “we’re a powerful organisation that cares about customers, products and the world, but not about our staff.” In this modern age, is this something that you can afford?

[July article by James Robertson, read the full article]

It used to be said that it was too hard to make SharePoint beautiful, but the following selection of examples show otherwise:

Screenshot courtesy of Kiwibank.

Screenshot courtesy of Bennett Jones.

Screenshot courtesy of Bennett Jones.

Screenshot courtesy of Bupa Australia.

Screenshot courtesy of Commwealth Bank.

(Whether you think all — or any! — of these designs is “beautiful” is naturally a matter of taste. The key thing is that each has a clear design and brand, beyond the out-of-the-box SharePoint look-and-feel.)

SharePoint 2010 provides much better tools for tailoring the design of sites, including a range of point-and-click options. These are OK, but limited, and most intranet teams will want to go beyond this.

Lynne Warneke, an experienced SharePoint implementer, outlines the situation:

Plan carefully and budget accordingly! Branding SharePoint 2010 is ‘easier’ than branding the previous version, 2007, but it’s still a complex and involved process if you want a unique visual design that’s a significant departure from the out-of-the-box look & feel. And, as with all things involving SharePoint customisation, there’s a right way, and a wrong way.

When deploying a new intranet on SharePoint, and developing a visual design, therefore:

• Start with clear brand goals. Start by defining the overall intranet brand, and use this as the foundation for the design process.
• Understand the technology platform. SharePoint has its own way of managing delivering sites, that is more complex and technical than many web content management systems. Like all technologies, the best outcomes are gained by understanding the product well, building on the strengths and avoiding the weaknesses.
• Get the right designer. Visual designs must be designed with SharePoint in mind, so they fit with the technology platform, and don’t introduce bottlenecks and performance issues. (There is little value in a beautiful design that costs a million dollars to implement.)
• Get designers and technologists in the same room. Typical website and intranet design processes involved getting a designer to produce a Photoshop file or HTML template, and then “throwing it over the wall” to the developers. This works poorly for SharePoint, so get both groups in the same room from the outset.
• Target effort for the greatest impact. As shown by the examples above, even fairly small changes to the basic template can have a large apparent effect. These include changing the top banner, updating the colours, and tweaking the standard layout elements.
• Manage the effort. Obsessively tweaking the smallest design elements can be hugely costly and time-consuming in SharePoint, and can impact on upgrade options. So be clear about when to “call it quits” on getting the perfect design.
• Ensure designs are accessible. Within the limits of SharePoint itself, all intranet designs should meet accessibility standards, including basic considerations such as colour contrast.

To wrap up with more advice from Lynne Warneke:

In conclusion, make sure you are working from the outset with people who know what they’re doing with SharePoint, heed their advice, be prepared to accept the application’s idiosyncrasies and work within its ‘limitations’, have enough budget to realise your vision, and within all the constraints, do have fun turning SharePoint’s corporate charcoal interface into something that will appeal to your intranet users. From experience I have learned that a more beautiful SharePoint can positively impact user adoption.

The Financial Brand interviewed Mary Olson, VP of Marketing, Delta Community, and talked about the credit union’s creative — and branded – employee intranet, affectionately named “Simon.” Simon is the portal for all employee communications — the guy who knows what’s going on inside the credit union. But Simon is more than just an intranet. He is a full-fledged internal spokesman and mascot, complete with a costume and foam head.

There always seems to be a debate on whether to give the Intranet a name or not. From my experience I think it is essential that the Intranet has a name and an individual design that differentiates it from any other company website or information sources. The name along with the design become your Intranet Brand.

Plenty of good advice here, and it’s worth noting that Peter is a member of the Intranet Leadership Forum.

But branding doesn’t only apply to those people, places, and things that project an image to the world at large. A brand identity is equally important for internal resources that only affect members of an organization. Although you’re marketing your intranet to an internal user community, an effective intranet brand can affect and direct user’s perception of the system.

• Will the name be inanimate, functional, industrial, emotive or something with personality?
• If relaunching the intranet, is the existing name still a viable option?
• Will it build on a company name, or is there ambition to create a distinct identity?
• Once a name is decided upon, what’s the best way to publicise the new site, and will the name become ingrained in organisational vernacular?

In this interview, Website Coordinator Michael Cleland explains why the City of Casey’s intranet was named ‘Boris’ upon its launch in 2006. The site has proved hugely successful, winning an Intranet Innovation award in its first year. Michael says the site’s success is due in large part to its usefulness, but also the creation and powerful, consistent promotion of the intranet’s brand.

S2D: Where does the Boris story start?

When we began developing the City of Casey intranet we didn’t know:

• What it was going to look like
• What it was going to contain
• What it was going to do

What we did know with absolute certainty is that it was not going to be known as ‘the intranet’.

[December KM Column written by Alex Manchester, read the full article]

Why name your intranet?

Having a catchy and memorable intranet name is a great way of promoting the intranet.

A name can help build an identity, even give the intranet a personality, removing that ‘techy’ edge. This is useful when trying to build staff awareness and engagement with a new or relaunched intranet.

It is an opportunity to leverage off the organisation’s brand or simply to differentiate the intranet from the organisation’s internet site.

What to consider in a name

Some names will work in a particular organisation while others may not. A culturally formal financial services organisation may opt for a name such as The Vault or Max, whereas Capsicum or The Lily Pad may sit more comfortably in a less formal environment.

For some, the benefit of the name comes from being synonymous with the aim and purpose of the intranet, such as The Hub or The Heart Beat for a health care organisation. Other organisations can leverage the profile that a fun and light-hearted image may provide.

Consider what type of name will best suit your organisation.

[CM Briefing 2008-15 written by Amanda Broomhall, read the full article]