BUILDING A GREAT INTRANETTHE 5 SECRETS TO

01• Who owns your intranet? Until you can

answer this question with certainty, every intranet project you will undertake will fail.• Hint: Just because IT stood up the

technology doesn’t mean they own what your organization does with it.

• Create an intranet governance body formed by members of key departments of your organization who will oversee your intranet.

• Make sure you have Senior Executive buy-in by having someone from that group on your intranet governance body.

CLEAR OWNERSHIP & EXECUTIVE SUPPORT

02• Governance is a framework for guiding and

directing how the intranet is used in your organization. If you don’t have a governance framework, get one. We’ve got a whitepaper that help you: Intranet Governance in 7 Easy Steps

• It’s important that your framework strikes a proper balance between centralizing control and a free-for-all.

• Your intranet will essentially be turning everyone into publishers of content – ensuring what content gets created and how it gets published needs to be clearly communicated.

SIMPLE AND EFFECTIVE GOVERNANCE

03• If all you do is stand up the technology on a

server and say to your employees, “here’s your intranet” – you are doomed.

• Take the time to understand how your organization will benefit from your intranet solution. Start with areas where you will get the most for your effort (improving your HR on-boarding, creating an accurate staff directory for remote work force etc), and build on those successes.

• Don’t be afraid to bring in skilled craftspeople to help you create compelling user interfaces or to help you gain an understanding of what your key business drivers should you be focusing on.

DON’T BLAME TECHNOLOGY

04• An intranet is meant to be a tool used by

your employees to support them in their work towards making your company successful.

• Do you know how your users interact with your intranet? If you don’t, find out. Ask them and look at your metrics for clues (you track metrics, right!? If not, this is a good place to start).

• Once you have insight, start small and solve those problems - don’t try to boil the ocean.

CONSULT YOUR USERS

05• Create a culture of sharing and content

development by encouraging and rewarding information sharing.• Start with a small group of keeners and let

them spread the word and build excitement. Pretty soon you’ll have the whole company participating

• Be smart and use technology to quickly and easily add foundational metadata to any content uploaded to your intranet so your users aren’t bogged down in the logistics of putting up content.

• Build a process (automated or manual) that will review and caul content that is no longer relevant – and be brutal about getting rid of outdated content and keeping your intranet relevant.

LET THE CREATIVE JUICES FLOW