During the run-up to my talk at the Digital London event on the 13th March (more info here), I will be bringing you psychological, evidence-based tips that you can use to successfully integrate your intranet into your new, social business. Following from last week’s blog post on intranet adoption and trust, this week we’ll look at 3 other elements vital for intranet success.

1. Leadership

For an intranet to succeed, the first step is to get the managers, CEOs and influential members of your organisation to to lead by example and encourage other employees to share their knowledge online [1].

For an intranet to be adopted throughout an entire organisation (or even an entire department), you have to first show your employees that they are important and that their voices count. By showing your employees that people from every position within the organisation are actively contributing, they will be much more likely feel secure enough to get involved. (Nice bit of social proof in action) [2].

You can gain greater performance, satisfaction and commitment from your employees by placing greater value on their positive psychological capital.

This means taking positive, demonstrable steps to invest in the hope, resilience, optimism and efficacy of your workers. One of the best ways you can do this is to run a wellness and resilience program, such as the fantastic resilience training offered by Mindapples [3].

3. Tone

The tone of an intranet is an important contributing factor to its success. Intranets tend to be designed by specialist providers, so it is vital that you equip your provider with the necessary tools to design an intranet that is stylistically congruent with the brand of your organisation. You can do this by making sure that all media, such as language, colours, and symbols, reflects and matches the style of your organisation [1].

Want to know more?
Come to my Digital London talk on 13th March!

References

[1] Natarajan, M. (2008). Knowledge Sharing through Intranet. Journal of Library and Information Technology, 28(5), 5-12.

[2] Bennett, E. E. (2008). Reflection, Learning, Technology, and the Socio-cultural Context of Virtual HRD: An Emerging Theory of Network Culture Dynamics. Theoretical and Methodological Issues in HRD.

[3] Luthans, F., Norman, S. M., Avolio, B. J., & Avey, J. B. (2008). The mediating role of psychological capital in the supportive organizational climate-employee performance relationship. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 29, 219–238.