IntranetFactory Blog

So many intranets are built around the organizational chart.

But people don't always work according to the org chart.

They work by doing specific tasks assigned to projects within their areas of expertise. In order for an Intranet to be truly useful, it needs to be designed to support user task flows and facilitate team interactions. This post will show you how to get started in that direction.

How Does Your Intranet Really Get Used?

Think for a moment about how your intranet really gets used. While the Intranet development team and senior management would love the intranet to be perceived as the virtual hub of all corporate activities, the truth is most employees usually visit the intranet to:

1) find a specific piece of information or

2) complete a specific task.

The easier you make it for employees to conduct these two specific activities, the more useful and usable your intranet will become.

And, if you're like most people, you don't "live" on the internet.  Instead, your work takes place in the real world and you periodically check a web site whenever you need to find a specific piece of information or need help completing a specific task.

Your intranet is no different. Employees will tend to use it just like any other website - it's just protected from the larger world within your corporate firewall.

While supplemental uses for the company intranet may also include access to company news and help for new employees to get started, an intranet's best use is to help all employees get things done.

Identify Key Tasks Within Your Organization

The first step to organize a task-based intranet is to identify a set of key tasks within your organization. This often requires going out into the field to observe and interview employees and/or setup focus groups.

Spend time with employees and observe how they work. See if you can get a clear understanding of what they do in their jobs, including any activities and information they could get online if it were made available to them.

Once you get a list of key tasks, prioritize them in order of importance. This will help you structure your navigation choices in an intuitive way that will be more easily understood by employees.

Review Intranet Analytics

Take a look at your intranet's usage and search logs to identify any patterns that might be common across departments. This will help you discover current trends and/or obstacles that employees have to work around on your current intranet.

Conduct A Survey

An online survey is a great way to solicit feedback from employees about your intranet. However, be careful in how you design the questions. Ask open-ended questions and remain as objective as possible, while simultaneously giving employees an opportunity to offer general suggestions or provide specific input regarding new features.

A Task-Based Intranet Takes Time

Although you may be on a crunch-deadline to get your new intranet rolled out the door, taking the time to learn about and understand your users, their projects and associated tasks is a critical step. In the long run it will help ensure that your intranet will improve productivity across the organization.

A “wireframe” is a simple sketch or schematic diagram representing the content and functionality of a single web page. A set of multiple wireframes representing an entire intranet becomes the prototype, or model of the site to come. Since they are quick to create and easy to change, wireframes are an integral part of the web design and development process.

Wireframes help everyone understand what a site needs to look like before a lot of time and effort is expended on actual development. Using wireframes, teams can consider many design options and solve design problems before committing resources to a specific design direction.

The best wireframes are simple sketches. Simple black and white sketches help people stay focused only on navigation, content areas and functionality. Wireframes should not dictate color choices, typography, pictures or other graphic design elements. They simply suggest what should go where.

Before you create a set of wireframes it’s important to have an understanding of your organization’s goals and who the audience is for your intranet. In other words, why are you doing this project?

Analyzing business goals and user needs is a critical first step to creating your intranet strategy. It ensures that time spent on wireframes or any other part of your intranet project will be used most effectively.

What’s the purpose of your intranet? Why do you need it? Do you need to facilitate better internal communications between departments or make documents easier to access by posting them online? What does the site need to do for the business?

Who is your audience? Will anyone care about your new intranet? Who? Knowing who your users are is critical. You could build the greatest intranet in the world, but it won’t matter if no one uses it. Find out who your users are and ask them what they need the site to do.

Once you’ve evaluated your business goals and user needs it’s time to validate them in the field. And that means talking to people before you start making wireframes.