In 2024, intranets, digital workplaces and digital employee experience (DEX) remain as critical as ever. They help employees to stay informed, complete tasks and find what they need. They drive productivity, collaboration, customer service and even innovation. They engage employees and help nurture organisational culture. Organisations continue to invest in digital workplace tools and technologies that deliver value in many different areas.

In the past few years we’ve seen a lot of change, including the pandemic and the introduction of remote work at scale. Technology also continues to evolve at speed, with a new wave of generative AI products and services emerging with the potential to make us more productive, and the power to disrupt multiple ways of doing things.

Through all this change, intranets and digital workplaces with good DEX excel, not only providing continuity and consistency, but also evolving to take in new features and capabilities. The teams behind these leading intranets and digital workplaces also make all the difference, ensuring the platforms and channels they launch and manage remain firmly centred on the needs of users.

The 2024 Intranet and Digital Workplace Awards show the very latest trends in intranets and digital workplaces. They confirm that digital employee experience continues to move forward. As in previous years, we received entries from all around the world. Entries covered the full range of organisations of different sizes, from different sectors and in different territories. Significantly, the general standard of submissions remains as strong as ever. 

Full details including hundreds of screenshots can be found in the Intranet & Digital Workplace Showcase report.

Here’s six of the key highlights:

1. Knowledge management is fuelling DEX

Knowledge management is a critical area for sectors such as professional services where client-facing lawyers, accountants and consultants provide expert advice. Intranets and related knowledge platforms in large, complex firms have become increasingly sophisticated, ensuring that thousands of knowledge assets and details of internal expertise are easily findable and accessible for staff.

Leading professional services firms are showing new levels of ambition in providing knowledge-fuelled platforms that bring together world-class search, innovative features and personalised access to knowledge. These intranets and knowledge hubs deliver high quality DEX to staff across different business divisions.

At EY, the team created a highly ambitious and innovative custom knowledge sharing and search platform based on Adobe and Elasticsearch technologies. With a breathtaking scale and a need to serve over 400,000 employees, Discover has remarkable functionality. Machine learning based on user behaviour drives more relevance over time, suggesting personalised items of interest. Users can also search through thousands of presentations housed on Discover from within the PowerPoint desktop application, and then add individual slides into the deck they are working on.

Notably the team has been able to ensure the experience remains fully user-centred, delivering DEX via ongoing user involvement and testing.

User-centred knowledge platforms US law firm Ogletree Deakins also developed an equally ambitious and innovative intranet that is wrapped around the knowledge needs of attorneys. Featuring multiple integrations that open up access to data fed from core systems, there is enterprise search integration, an upgraded custom chatbot called KARLOS, and a revamped knowledge sharing area for model documents. A powerful and highly detailed custom expert search provides background information to enable team selection and find the right expert.

Accounting firm Grant Thornton USA also put their new intranet at the centre of their knowledge management efforts. Canvas features a new Coveo enterprise search, automated content governance, new people profiles and a private dashboard with an incredible number of integrations – one of the most extensive we’ve seen.

On a lesser scale, yet still impressive in its focus, immigration specialist law firm Fragomen revamped their country pages with new search capabilities prudently crafted around key queries carried out by the lawyers. All of these examples provide access to critical knowledge that is now more findable, and actively support a better employee experience.

The homepage of EY’s Discover platform. Screenshot appears courtesy of EY.

2. The intranet project playbook has hit a new high

Intranets have been an established part of the enterprise technology landscape for a quarter of a century. Over that time, they have continued to absorb new features and take on more complex functionality. As intranets get more sophisticated, the accompanying implementation projects have also grown in sophistication too.

Each year the methodologies that drive leading intranet projects continue to improve, leaning into best practices, ensuring users are involved from day one, and taking into account change management. The intranet project ‘playbook’ continues to be more professional, with excellent execution seen from project scoping through to launch and beyond, regardless of organisation size and sector.

Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation only has 200 employees, but the implementation of a new iteration of their ‘SuperCharged’ intranet based on SharePoint Online was delivered in a way that trumps many larger intranet projects. The team consistently made good use of frameworks, including using a “four voices” model to consider involvement from stakeholders, and a six-step model for interacting with content owners. The excellent execution has resulted in a strong intranet with enhanced search, refreshed content and good levels of adoption. 

Meanwhile at social care organisation Anglicare Sydney, the professional and knowledgeable intranet team redesigned and re-platformed their ‘Connect’ intranet. In a best-practices roll-out, the project followed a clear eight-step methodology that involved user input throughout.

A standout was the persona and user research work that ensured there was a crystal clear understanding of the needs of the organisation’s frontline care staff. This influenced the detail around page design and mobile access. The result is an uplift in adoption and time saved for employees, achieved relatively quickly.

At Scope Disability Services, the team’s intranet roll-out faced challenging circumstances, but despite this the project followed great practices that other teams can learn from. Even little touches add to the body of knowledge that we can all draw on, such as giving a special gift to a ‘working group’ who gave input on the project and using a consent tracker for images used.

The progress of an intranet content review at Guardian of NZ Superannuation. Screenshot appears courtesy of Guardian of NZ Superannuation.

3. Digital workplace teams draw on superpowers

Launching and managing intranets and digital workplaces is tricky. There are lots of moving parts and the teams involved have to wear a lot of different hats. Small central teams are also frequently under-resourced, having to serve huge, diverse workforces, and navigate unexpected changes.

Time and time again the intranet or digital workplace team manages to pull out all the stops to make things happen. By drawing on their experience, skills and the right mindset, leading teams are the “special sauce” that make good intranets and digital workplaces truly great.

At Scope Disability Services, the small intranet team faced a difficult project to create a new intranet accompanying a three-way merger. Working to a compressed timeline across three legacy intranets with totally different governance structures, two Microsoft tenants, and the cultural sensitivities that come with a merger, the intranet team consistently came up with creative and pragmatic approaches.

During the project the team relied on existing resources, came up with sensible compromises, and advanced some smart ideas. The fact they didn’t compromise their original vision for the intranet is testament to their quick thinking.

At Fragomen, the content curation team went the extra mile to transform a library of specialist knowledge by adding new search capabilities, including an incredibly useful feature in comparing rules across different jurisdictions.

Despite not having a background in IT, the team implemented PnP search without the help of their IT colleagues, saving on development time. This new-found knowledge has also enabled them to develop other areas of the intranet with similar search capabilities, including the firm’s policy library.

At Duke Energy, the high performing intranet team have been managing ‘The Portal’ for years in a clear and consistent way that is underpinned by good governance. The Portal is now integral to the way everybody works at Duke Energy and enjoys great adoption. Much of this is down to the excellent management practices from the Portal Team.

The Scope Group intranet homepage. Screenshot appears courtesy of Scope Group.

4. Continuous improvement is king (and queen)

Successful intranets and digital workplaces continue to improve over time, driven by a program of incremental enhancements, new content and features. This allows teams to deliver a platform based on continual improvement that remains close to users and emergent needs to support better digital employee experience.

World class intranets and the teams behind them factor in this approach from day one, initially launching a Minimal Viable Product (MVP) or a more focused version of a platform. They then encourage user feedback and metrics to guide and prioritise a backlog of improvements, released across a regular launch schedule. This approach also helps deliver highly sophisticated solutions that are hard to release in one go due to cost and complexity.

Many of the winning entries in the 2024 Awards exhibit a strong commitment for continuous improvement. Grant Thornton USA’s knowledge-infused intranet ‘Canvas’ was created in 2018, but additional features added each year has not only sustained but increased adoption and value. This includes a layer of custom business and content apps that have been delivered via the intranet. Central to the success of the platform is a network of knowledge ambassadors across the business who not only support content governance, but can also feed in requests and give input to support the evolution of Canvas.

The Department of Education Western Australia’s intranet ‘Ikon’ was also created in 2018 and while very different to Canvas, it has similarly evolved through a series of new content templates, integrations and improvements to existing functionality. A feedback form is on every intranet page and a clear improvement mindset from the intranet team has resulted in an intranet that keeps on getting better.

EY has also taken a similar approach to evolve their exciting Discover knowledge platform, with a group of users known as the “Sounding Board” who can give input for ongoing improvement. 

Duke Energy’s intranet ‘The Portal’ has been around for over two decades, sustained by a program of continuous improvement, delivered by a stable and super-savvy intranet team. In the past three years alone the team have re-platformed from ‘classic’ to ‘modern’ SharePoint, introduced the Viva Connections dashboard, added a new HR area based on a Life Journeys structure, built new personalised links and subscriptions tools and more.

Despite its long life span, the intranet feels like a new platform, has great adoption, excellent strategic alignment, robust governance and sophisticated features. One of the reasons the intranet is so successful is the highly user-centric approach of the team, with everything based on extensive user testing and feedback. We were thrilled to give them our Platinum Award.

The Duke Energy intranet homepage. Screenshot appears courtesy of Duke Energy.

5. Content laser-focused on users always wins

Intranets help employees stay informed, get things done, find what they need and feel engaged. All of this relies on good content that is purposeful, accurate, up to date, readable, engaging, searchable, accessible, well-structured and relevant. That’s notoriously difficult to achieve at scale and over time, especially across a devolved network of publishers.

Creating and maintaining valuable content that ticks all these boxes and is truly wrapped around the needs of users requires having the right governance, processes and support in place. Leading intranets teams are investing in the right frameworks, tools and training to make it happen.

At the Department of Education Western Australia the team not only merged 68 intranets together, but also realised a vision to deliver content that is purposeful, readable, findable and accessible to a diverse workforce of 67,000 employees.

This has been achieved by defining and then ruthlessly applying a set of user-centric content design principles and processes. This is reflected in an overall governance framework, which is strictly enforced to consistently execute the principles without exception.

The level of attention and detail reflected in the layout of multiple templates is highly impressive. The way the team has stuck to its guns and also developed strong relationships to deliver user-focused content is admirable. The team even persuaded their legal team to write their content in a more consistent and user-friendly way!

At MAN Energy Solutions the team have embarked on a program of improvement to enhance intranet features, design and content. One standout is an automated approach to content governance that initiates a review and archive process, helping uphold content standards across a decentralised publishing community. Other features delivered include a new editor hub where content owners can keep on top of their content, seeing which is performing well and anything coming up for review.

Other teams also worked on strong, user-centric content design. At Duke Energy the team redesigned their HR information and related people-content based on a compelling “Life Journeys” concept, helping users find the information they want more quickly, while also making it more engaging. Overall these approaches are ensuing that content is kept focused on user needs – and that means intranet success.

The Dept of Education Western Australia intranet homepage. Screenshot appears courtesy of the Dept of Education Western Australia intranet homepage.

6. Winning teams make informed tech choices

Selecting the right base technology and related approach that aligns with your intranet requirements, user needs, strategic objectives and brand is critical. Savvy teams ensure they choose the right tech based on discovery and research, rather than on assumptions or a predetermined choice.

These days there can be pressure to ensure an intranet is based on SharePoint Online and use mainly out-of-the-box features. While this can be a valid method, successful intranet teams are taking a more nuanced approach to leveraging in-a-box intranet software, customisation, and non-SharePoint solutions to deliver results.

Some teams want to avoid customisation as far as possible to reduce costs, avoid technical debt and stay agile. Some leading intranets, however, are truly embracing customisation to deliver an intranet which meets their unique requirements relating to both features and design.

At Comcast the team have launched a beautiful intranet that is truly consumer-grade, with an immersive design. The intranet is heavily customised to meet the high standards of a media organisation as well as the thoroughly researched needs of their users and content owners.

Similarly Duke Energy leverages SharePoint Online out of the box as far as possible, but also has a number of customised web parts, not only to ensure the intranet design is consistent with the rest of Duke Energy’s digital ecosystem, but also to deliver unique features such as a prominent peer recognition area of the intranet homepage. Other winning intranets from Grant Thornton USA and Ogletree Deakins also feature heavy customisation in order to facilitate unique KM-powered capabilities.

While SharePoint Online (and Microsoft 365) is the leading base technology for intranets, it is certainly not the only choice. At EY the team have delivered a highly sophisticated and complex knowledge-sharing platform which leverages the Adobe suite of products, not only for the core intranet CMS but also for personalisation, workflow, analytics and more.

Meanwhile Anglicare Sydney sought intranet solutions that would help deliver engaging and useful content to both desk-bound and frontline staff. Anglicare picked Interact, an “in a box” solution, rather than SharePoint. Anglicare even did a market scan involving over 30 different intranet solutions, finding the tech that was right to deliver their now award-winning intranet.

The Anglicare Sydney intranet homepage. Screenshot appears courtesy of Anglicare Sydney.

Get inspiration from 11 great case studies with screenshots

The full 2024 Intranet and Digital Workplaces Showcase report features detailed case studies of all 12 winning entries, each detailed with multiple screen shots of the sites in question. At AU$299/€180/US$200 it’s exceptional value, helping to both inform and inspire intranet and digital workplace teams. Report sales also support the effort it takes us to keep on running the Awards (which have no associated fees).

Enter next year!

If you’re currently doing great work on your intranet or digital workplace, visit the Awards page, and sign up to be notified when next year’s Awards opens for entries in February 2025.