“Intranet effectiveness” is one way to approach Intranet governance. It can succeed where where the company Intranet is large, scattered and when there are concerns about quality and cost of Intranet sites and applications. Also, this approach fits well where a traditional top-down governance model has not been successful. The idea behind effectiveness is to offer a more holistic way of identifying what makes a “good” Intranet site vs. a poor one. Effectiveness criteria go beyond “look and feel” to ask questions about useage, support, help and feedback, search and usability. Look and feel is important, but it’s not the only thing to look at when evaluating an Intranet.
Effectiveness programs can succeed by empowering site owners to rate their own sites. Creating a scorecard tool or even offering criteria in a simple spreadsheet document, site owners can answer the questions about effectiveness and rate their own sites, taking ownership of site quality, rather than having the more traditional “corporate says” approach which can create bad feeling.
An effectiveness program can also focus on very particular pain points. For example, at IBM, a Web Effectiveness program was launched several years ago as a complement to the traditional user experience standards governance process. In this case, the effectiveness criteria centered around online direct sales, and only elements of a Web page that support the sales process are examined. The Web Effectiveness program works with the User Experience team, because UE standards include tools, templates and ideas for improving the success of the sales site, for example, a template for integrating online help is part of the Internet UE Standards portfolio. At IBM, the Web Effectiveness program does not evaluate non-sales parts of the Internet (for example, Partner or Support sites), focusing instead on a particular point of interest to IBM Web management.
Effectiveness programs approach for Intranet management can be permanent, as an ongoing philosophy and approach, or they can be launched to focus on a specific and current pain point (search effectiveness, for example). When that problem is cleared up, the model can be used for another issue, or it may not be needed at all.
