The corporate intranet isn’t dead; It’s had a makeover!
Corporate intranets today are easier to navigate, more engaging, and aesthetically pleasing than ever before. We consider them complete content and employee experience platforms with endless advantages for your organization.
Back in 2017, Slater Hill and Powell Software were first prompted to write this post after reading these statistics about employee engagement:
- 70% of employees in the U.S. are not engaged at work.
But:
- Connected teams are 20-25% more efficient; and
- Unless properly designed, fewer than 50% of employees will use the intranet daily.
These figures hold today. In 2021, 64% of employees were still not engaged at work. Connecting employees is more important than ever as employees work remotely. And employees expect an intranet experience to rival the other social platforms they use daily.
The (new and improved) corporate intranet can help overcome these challenges!
Why do (and why should) companies still use the intranet?
From our experience of implementing modern employee intranets in different size organizations and receiving feedback from our clients on the positive turnaround in employee engagement, we can confidently share 5 reasons why you still need a corporate intranet:
1. Increased productivity for your teams
Ineffective communication impacts productivity, according to 86% of executives. Having a dedicated employee communications platform streamlines information sharing.
An intranet helps:
- Reduce email use – did you know the average employee spends 3.1 hours daily on emails? An intranet provides more attractive options for company-wide sharing
- Allow for quicker responses on small to medium issues – FAQs, helpdesk, and resources are accessible to everyone in one location
- Make information easy to find intranet is a knowledge management tool to avoid information overload
- Give your team access to all the tools and information they need to perform in their role effectively
2. Easy collaboration
From 55% in 2019 to 79% in 2021, the use of collaboration tools is rising. With the mass move to remote and hybrid work, it’s no surprise. But whether your team is in the same location or not, a corporate intranet makes it possible for your team to:
- Communicate freely – Contributors can share company news, Yammer communities, and Microsoft Teams integrations make conversations seamless
- Easily exchange ideas – Especially if your company intranet has a dedicated idea management tool
- Share documents – Every department can store critical documents like HR policies and user guides
- Complete work together – With an intranet on Office 365, you can collaborate in real-time
- Interact with different teams and remain aware of what each team is working on.
3. Strong company culture
Easy collaboration and communication foster an environment for your team to interact and get to know one another, especially if you:
- Incorporate a social element into your intranet – From social media feeds to recreating water cooler chats, the intranet is a social space
- Use the intranet as a space to publish news and announcements – Avoid getting lost in overflowing inboxes, and post where employees will see the message
- Communicate company culture – Keep the culture alive, bring corporate messaging to the intranet
- Recognize employees and teams – Give shout-outs and keep everyone in the company aware of achievements
4. Secure knowledge management
In an era of information overload, the corporate intranet is a single source of truth for all company information. It provides one central place to store all your company documents that are always up-to-date and can be accessed by anyone on your team.
Why is this so important?
- It ensures that staff turnover doesn’t affect access to knowledge.
- Employees find the information they need to perform their jobs, especially with tools like search to help.
If you choose an intranet on Office 365, you can benefit from Microsoft security.
5. An engaged, connected workforce
A well-designed and modern corporate intranet transforms the employee experience to promote efficiency, growth, innovation, and connection – all key ingredients of an engaged workforce.
So you’ve decided that the corporate intranet is the way to go for your organization? Now comes the tricky part, selecting the right one. To help, we have created a guide to finding the right intranet for you. Download it and start your digital workplace journey.