Intranet projects are often longer and more involved than most teams expect. While no two projects are the same, and organisational circumstances vary greatly, teams should have some core expectations going into a design or redesign project.

In particular, as there is often pressure from stakeholders to deliver a new site quickly, it is important to have a realistic project plan and to set appropriate timeframes from the outset.

Project activities

A number of project activities are common across intranet projects. As the Intranet Roadmap (www.steptwo.com.au/products/roadmap) outlines, these may include:

• researching staff needs
• determining intranet strategy and project scope
• developing a business case and obtaining funding
• determining overall intranet structure
• developing page designs
• testing and refining both structure and designs with staff
• conducting a content inventory
• determining required content
• cleaning and migrating content
• selecting and implementing new technology
• communication and change management

[CM Briefing 2010-12, read the full article]