From defining your objectives to involving stakeholders, choosing the right platform and ensuring security and confidentiality, we'll cover everything you need to know to create a successful intranet that meets your company's needs.
So let's get started!
Define the aims and objectives of the intranet
It is essential to define the aims and objectives of your intranet before building it. Decide what you want from your intranet. It could be improving communication and collaboration, streamlining HR processes, improving document management, or all of the above. This will help you determine the features and functionality you need for your intranet.
Involving stakeholders in the launch of the intranet
For a successful launch, it is essential to involve stakeholders (employees, managers and IT staff) in the intranet planning and development process.
Gathering feedback and ideas from stakeholders will ensure that your intranet meets their needs and expectations. You can do this by organising a brainstorming session with a few people and sending a form to all the employees who will be using the intranet.
Choosing the right intranet platform
Choosing the right intranet platform is essential to building a modern intranet that meets your organisation's needs. Research and compare different intranet software to find the best platform for your organisation. Consider factors such as user experience, design, functionality and cost.
If you want to display or give access to data for one or more of your other tools, make sure that the platform you choose can connect to these tools. If not, you will need to contact an agency. You can develop a custom intranet that can connect to the API of your tools.
Designing an effective intranet
Designing an effective intranet, with a user-friendly interface and the necessary functionality, is the key to successful adoption.
Make sure that employees can easily navigate the website, find the information they need and interact with other employees.
Foster a sense of community with the intranet's social features. Make the intranet an effective tool for employee engagement.
We recommend integrating functions that are often used by users so that they can connect to the intranet on a regular basis: company news, list of events, chat between employees, etc.
Training employees to use the intranet
To ensure that your intranet is successfully adopted, it is essential to provide adequate training and support for your employees.
Make sure your employees understand how to use the intranet and its functionalities.
Provide ongoing support to answer any problems or questions.
Monitoring and measuring success
Once your intranet has been launched, it is essential to monitor its use and measure its success. Gather feedback from users. Then analyse the usage data to identify areas for improvement. This will ensure that your intranet is delivering the expected benefits. Don't neglect to go into the office and talk to people.
If you are launching a first version with limited functionality, be clear about this. You don't want users to have a bad image of the intranet from day one.
Encourage users to adopt the intranet and foster a feedback culture to continually improve the intranet experience. For example, you can add a button to a satisfaction survey on the main page. Feedback should only take a few seconds.
Key features
Here are four key characteristics of a successful intranet:
- User-friendly interface A successful intranet must have a user-friendly interface that is easy to navigate and search. The interface must be intuitive and accessible to all employees, whatever their technical skills.
- Customisation An effective intranet should allow employees to personalise their home page and tailor their experience to their needs. This can increase employee engagement and help them find the information they need more efficiently.
- Collaboration tools A high-performance intranet must include collaboration tools such as wikis, chat and file sharing. These tools enable employees to communicate and work together more effectively, wherever they are.
- Analysis and reports A high-performing intranet should offer analytics and reporting capabilities that enable administrators to measure the effectiveness of the intranet and identify areas for improvement. Analytics can also help organisations track user engagement, adoption rates and usage patterns to improve intranet functionality and performance.
Conclusion
Intranets are an excellent tool for improving communication, collaboration and productivity within your organisation. However, creating a successful intranet requires careful planning and execution.
A successful intranet can be a game-changer for your business. It streamlines processes and improves communication and collaboration between employees.
By respecting the seven essential points presented in this article, you will increase your chances of creating an intranet that meets the needs of your employees. What's more, it will help your company achieve its objectives.
Don't forget to define your objectives, involve your stakeholders and guarantee security and confidentiality. With these steps, you can create a successful intranet that will make your business more efficient and productive.
If you would like more information on the intranet, please read our previous article entitled « Is creating an intranet a good idea in 2023? »
Want to launch an intranet? Contact us, we have a team of specialists to develop your project.
