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The intranet opportunity

Many organizations fail to recognize the potential value of establishing an intranet. Although it isn’t a magic bullet a well-managed intranet can save significant amounts of staff time, by making it easier for users to find the information and tools they need.

What is an intranet? It is an internal web site, for the use of staff members only. The setting up of an intranet is generally justified on the basis of improving internal communications, often as part of a more comprehensive Knowledge Management initiative.

The intranet home page is a portal to information resources and applications. One of the key features of intranet systems is the ability for users to share information, ultimately for the benefit of all.

Typically an intranet performs one or more of the following functions:

• Linking and navigation. If your organization uses one or more internal or external web applications, an intranet page with links to them helps users to locate the ones they need. Shared filesystems can be made much easier to navigate with the judicious addition of explanatory web pages.
• Collaboration. Applications such as wikis and discussion forums encourage internal communication and (very usefully) record the results in searchable form.
• Publishing. Every organization needs to distribute internal items of news and other documents. Email has largely replaced the physical noticeboard, but it has certain disadvantages. Do your users all save important notices they’ve received in their own private folders? That’s a lot of redundant diskspace. Better to have a single copy of each item on the intranet instead. To ensure users know about something important you can still send out an email, but with a link to the document rather than an attachment.
• Search. If documents published through your intranet are indexed so they can be searched (in a similar manner to pages on the internet), this can be very helpful to users in locating material they need. (Note however that the indexes may require a great deal of extra diskspace, and that intranet search engines vary greatly in their quality and ease of use.)

Modern intranet technology is mature and full of great features. However, to realise value from an investment in an intranet requires much more than installing some new software and hardware:

• Your intranet needs to reflect your individual business needs. Sometimes the intranet has to be customised for your processes, while some processes might benefit by being adjusted to fit round the intranet.
• Often people are averse to sharing knowledge because “knowledge is power”. You may need to provide incentives to reward collaborative behaviour.
• Management commitment to an intranet project is vital for its success.

However, with the right approach an intranet can bring substantial rewards. Many organizations report great improvements in productivity through better communication.

Interested in knowing more about what an intranet can do for your organization? Get in touch with us today and let us explain the benefits.