Blog | 18 March 2022
Open intranets – how it works in practice
Transparency, accessibility and democracy are usually the watchwords for open intranets. But what does it mean in practice to have an open intranet? And what are the pros and cons? Johan Nilsson, Digital Workplace Advisor at Sitevision, had a chat with the Royal College of Music and Södertörn University.
A few weeks ago, we read that Tomelilla municipality launched an open intranet. It made me wonder why they choose an open intranet and how it affects the user experience. So I contacted two of Sitevision's customers, the Royal College of Music and Södertörn University, and asked them to tell me about their solutions.
Why an open intranet?
The Royal College of Music launched its intranet in spring 2017 for its approximately 300 employees. The intranet is service-oriented with news, shortcuts, calendars and routines. There is no login mode and the intranet is accessible to everyone – all in line with their ambition of transparency and accessibility.
– Open intranets are quite common in higher education because we share a lot of information and knowledge between institutions, explain Marie Halling and Jenny Nordlöf at the Royal College of Music.
– That was the big reason why we chose an open intranet as well, says Therese Andersson, who works at Södertörn University.
Södertörn University launched its intranet in the spring of 2021 for the organisation's approximately 1,000 employees and is a "semi-open" intranet that also has a logged-in mode. In this way, the intranet's content can be accessible – while the user gets a personalised experience with news, calendar bookings, Teams areas and emails from Outlook.
For Södertörn University, an open intranet was not an obvious choice. They previously had a more traditional intranet where the user had to log in. Prior to the intranet project, they therefore conducted a survey to find out whether employees visited other organisations' open intranets. The results showed that it was common among several employee groups.
Both the Royal College of Music and Södertörn University highlight the aspect that all published content is public documents – and that the open intranet makes it easier for citizens to access the material.
Så här ser Södertörns högskolas intranät ut – eller medarbetarwebb, som de också kallar den.
Editorial challenges
Working with an open intranet places different demands on editorial work because you mix internal and external communication. It is important to develop guidelines and tone that make it clear and easy for editors to create content for both employees and external visitors.
Södertörn University has decided that content aimed at the majority of employees is published on the intranet, while content aimed at a team or individual employee is published on the Teams areas (behind login). The intranet is therefore aimed at employees, but since it is open, others are welcome to take part in the content (especially other higher education institutions). The Royal College of Music also focuses on the employee, while the content is also consumed by external visitors.
Collaboration and productivity
What the Royal College of Music and Södertörn University have in common is that there are no interaction opportunities for employees and external visitors on the intranet. All interaction and collaboration takes place in other systems.
However, Södertörn University is planning to launch a new case management system integrated into the intranet shortly, where they can have direct dialog with employees. In the logged-in mode, the employee also receives notifications of unread emails in Outlook and a list of other digital tools. The Royal College of Music uses Microsoft 365 and other tools, but separately from the intranet. And the focus of both intranets is primarily service content such as syllabi, guidelines and operational information.
Reflections
Common to the Royal College of Music and Södertörn University – but also to other organisations that have chosen open intranets – is transparency and accessibility. On the one hand, it is about lowering barriers for others to access the organisation's information, and on the other hand, facilitating collaboration and knowledge sharing between organisations.
Both organisations have chosen to move interaction and collaboration to platforms other than the intranet. Although Södertörn University has a 'semi-open' intranet, there are no opportunities for collaboration on the intranet – only links to external systems. These boundaries make it clear to employees and the organisation where to have digital meetings and collaborations.
The Royal College of Music also points out that an open intranet contributes to employer branding by allowing potential employees to easily gain insight into guidelines, staff handbooks and what the organisation stands for.
When it comes to the editorial work, it has been clearly adapted to the target group. On the intranet, both organisations choose to communicate mainly to employees and stakeholders from other educational institutions.
What are your thoughts on open intranets? Feel free to comment!