Comments on: Why does your intranet suck?

By: Scott

Scott — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 19:59:00 +0000

Our company (fortune 500) will not invest the time as well. I think they agree that our intranet is bad, but I am not sure they understand how BAD. The reasons given for not taking action are: 1) users seem to be able to figure it out today, what is this really going to buy us?, 2) we have too many other large IT projects right now to devote resources to it.

By: anthmatic

anthmatic — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 15:46:00 +0000

The company that I work for recently invested in a major overhaul of our retail intranet based on the IBM Connections platform. The company absolutely sees the value in social communities in the workplace- which is awesome! Sadly, searching for important information is chaotic and documents/tools are hard to find. I fear that it will stay this way for quite some time…

That said, while our intranet is pretty and decent to use, I find the UX to be broken and muddled with amazing features that have been poorly implemented.

By: vinyl stickers

vinyl stickers — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 22:35:00 +0000

When the client knows their site sucks it is critical to start the process of improving it with an assessment. It is vital to understand what employees need and what the business requirements are. We assess the information we collect and make recommendations based on our extensive experience and best practices. We deliver detailed key findings and recommendations.

By: Sequel Group

Sequel Group — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 14:35:00 +0000

In our experience there are many good and even great examples out there where companies do invest in the intranet. Invest doesn’t ahve to mean money or expensive consultants, for the best part an investment of time from focussed individuals who take time to consider the needs and motivations of their colleagues is more than enough to turn mediocre into good and good into great.

Perfection is obviously when communications, IT and HR get together with a single goal: Create something with the user in mind.

By: Justin

Justin — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 19:56:00 +0000

A good amount of time has been invested in the building and improving of our intranet. I don’t see it any different than any other website. It needs to be well organized and easy on the eyes. Do I spend as much time on it than what I spend on the main site? No. But certain things need to work really well, are massaged quite often and easy to use.

By: Matt Hamilton

Matt Hamilton — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 12:00:00 +0000

I’m not sure why, but we are currently seeing the same thing. To the point we are running a roadshow series entitled “Building an Intranet Your People Will Love”. It is very little about technology, but mainly about user interface design and the likes. Mostly centred on simplifying interfaces:

http://www.netsight.co.uk/blog/the-next-10-intranet-lessons-event-to-happen-in-reading

We still see so many intranets that come out of the IT department (as opposed to the public sites generally coming from the marketing/comms dept) that no consideration has gone towards the actual use of the intranet or what is trying to be achieved by using it (or what problem it is trying to solve).

Another aspect could be the fact that the intranet is not generally visible outside the organisation so in some minds doesn’t have to be ‘pretty’ (which is, alas, what many reduce design/ux down to).

A decent intranet is a tool that should be used daily by those in an organisation to help get their job done, so really the user interface of it (in my mind) is even more important than that of the public website (which in most cases is merely one-way dissemination of information).

-Matt

By: alex wells

alex wells — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 20:05:00 +0000

A poor intranet may suck but its better then nothing! been trying to get approval for one at work but they are just not having it.

At the end of the day a better UI will save people time and if there is enough people using it that time will add up and more then pay for the cost of implementing a decent UI

By: Steve Morris

Steve Morris — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 16:45:00 +0000

You’ve highlighted a big problem. I think companies need to see the benefits of interfaces that go beyond reliable and functional, and even past usable into pleasurable (to put it the way Aaron Walter might). I know from experience that some corporations ‘talk the talk’ about employee engagement but don’t always see the bigger picture – it’s not all nice coffee and beanbags! Surely if they want to really engage the workforce it might it be sensible to provide tools that are easy and enjoyable to use so that employees approach notionally dull (but important) tasks with enthusiasm not trepidation. Whilst my motivation is a bit different to a salaried employee of a bigger company I find doing my own business accounting rather enjoyable (not to say quicker and easier) since I started using FreeAgent, when before the idea filled me with dread.

By: Rob Haskell

Rob Haskell — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 14:05:00 +0000

I guess intranet does not need the artistic and usability attention that public sites do. First the user can probably be assumed to have certain level of competence, second, they are not going to “go away” just because the user experience stinks. Having said that, user experience would seem to be important after all for company morale and inefficiency. One important step forwards might be to question the wisdom of placing the task of building the intranet solely in the hands of IT.

By: camillevau

camillevau — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 12:39:00 +0000

Intranet analytics should be decided in the first step of a project that ” help employees communicate and collaborate”, but they are commonly used as forensic indicators to know why we have to adopt a new platform every two years .. exactly as your sentence stands.

With this “new approach”, you do not decide on “why we can’t make them working on the platform”, but you can progress to “what do we want them to do on the platform” ?