Essential and operational intranets – thoughts from J.Boye CoP

Sitting high up and looking down on the world is a nice way to get some perspective on intranet issues that too often tend to pull us down! Yesterday was a day well spent with the new London-based Community of Practice created by J.Boye.

My keynote on social media behind the firewall triggered a lot of discussion as did the firsthand intranet case studies provided by Allen Huish of BA and Simon Ashley and Janie Perrins of the Environment Agency (our host and the scene for my foggy photo down onto one of the best views in London – normally!).

Some thought-provoking take-ways from the day-long session: essential & operational

• The intranet is like an ATM machine (cash distributor): it lets you do what you want, when and where.
• If you want to make your intranet essential, find the one thing that everyone in your organization must do, and put it on the intranet.
• Measure, measure, measure. (This was emphasised in convincing ways in both case studies, although my personal experience is that this depends quite a lot on the company culture.)
• Track all operational goals (ref: BA case.)
• Be sure you really know your users. (ref Environment Agency case: they not only did personas – for which they won the 2007 Intranet Innovation Awards -  but also make the personas live on as the intranet team continues their research and gets to know the personas better and better).
• Understanding your user goals is good. But be sure to balance it with what fits your organizational strategy.

For more information about the J.Boye CoPs, contact J.Boye directly. I’m looking forward to my involvement in the Geneva-based CoP which will take place on February 24th. I’ll be doing a workshop for J.Boye the preceding day on “Making your intranet essential“.

Comments are now closed