The Intranet Team: People Involved

As with any project, having an effective team to back it is essential to building a successful intranet. An intranet is not like a building. You don't just build it and hand over the keys. As was discussed above, an intranet is a broad concept, a way to store and retrieve certain kinds of information within an organization. This means that the intranet must constantly adapt to changes within the organization in a number of different ways. This requires that you have a team who know your organization, and know the technologies used on the intranet.

Management

If management in general is not behind the intranet project it is already doomed to fail. Much of life in any organization, more so as they increase in size, is a matter of politics. Because an intranet, by definition, tends to work over the whole of an organization, setting it up is going to require the cooperation of a number of departments, and their managers. This means that for every bit of information needed to set up and maintain the intranet, you'll need the cooperation of that department and its management. If cooperation is lacking in some departments this will influence the quality of the content of the network and make it less likely for users to get into the habit of using the intranet. An important part of gaining trust from the managers of different departments is showing them the benefits the intranet will have for them.

Designers

Because an intranet will often use a web-like interface you'll need somebody to deal with the look and feel of the front end. This may include page layout, branding, usability and accessibility issues, and maybe a bit of information architecture. Don't be tempted to think that these issues are purely cosmetic; a good design can make your intranet pleasant and easy to use, which will encourage people to make use of it and keep coming back.

"Because an intranet, by definition, tends to work over the whole of an organization, setting it up is going to require the cooperation of a number of departments, and their managers"

Developers

As well as people to handle the front-end, you'll need somebody to code the back end. For a simple intranet this may be as basic as knowing how to put together some HTML, but if you are seeking to automate complex tasks via the intranet then you'll need somebody with knowledge of a suitable web scripting language, databases, or content management systems.

It is likely that you will be given the task of integrating existing systems with the intranet. If there are already a number of systems working within an organization, the chances are that you are not going to be familiar with all of them. Involving the developers who are responsible for these systems can only save you a lot of work.

Network Administrators

Since the intranet is run on the company's network you'll need the cooperation of the network administrator. Since the introduction of an intranet will have a major effect on a network, server use will increase, affecting server performance and the network itself will slow down as more information is transported over it. In addition, you will need somebody familiar with the security settings for the network to make sure information is kept secure. If you have the support of the systems administrator from the start, you can plan for the likely effects of the intranet, and make sure the correct infrastructure is in place to deal with them.

In order to use any of the company data that makes intranets so interesting to work on, you're going to need to get access to those systems. Very often access will turn out to be a matter of network access and user permissions. Getting a number of systems to work together seamlessly, ensuring privacy, security, and efficiency can be challenging enough. If on top of that you need to submit every little change in network setting to your administrator in triplicate hoping he or she is in an agreeable mood today is not going to make your life any easier.

A good administrator will also be familiar with the 'quirks' of his network. In real life networks are almost never exactly the same as the official network diagram indicates. In order to get an intranet off the ground, especially an interesting one, you'll need to know about these things. Getting the systems administrator in on an intranet project (and enthusiastic about it if you can) is essential and will save you a lot of frustration in the long run.

Content Contributors

The importance of content, and of content management, will come up many times in this book. No matter how revolutionary your intranet ideas are, how incredibly efficient your code is, or how many millions you invest in your internal network, if the intranet has nothing of practical use to offer its users, they will never use it. People are not going to search for data on the intranet if, from prior experience, it's not there. The more often this happens the less likely a user will even try to find information on the intranet. All of this comes down to content, and as a developer you probably won't be the one providing it. It is important to realize that if those people who are supposed to be responsible for maintaining the content of the intranet do not, the project will fail, completely. It is important that early on you identify who in your organization has information that should be present on the intranet, and who will be keeping it updated.

"It is important that early on you identify who in your organization has information that should be present on the intranet, and who will be keeping it updated."

Users

Contrary to common belief, the success of a piece of software is not measured by how well it was designed or how efficiently it works, but in whether or not people will use it or not. What software will people use and what won't they? Well obviously it will have to be well designed, user-friendly, intuitive, and a very efficient way to work, but most importantly: it has to do what its users want it to do, what they expect it to do, and preferably do it in a way (or at least look like its doing it in a way) the user expects.

The goal of IT projects is to make existing processes work more efficiently. Who do you think knows more about those processes: management? A $250 an hour external analyst? A business expert? No, it's the people who carry them out 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. It's these people who will be using the system you are creating and it is these people who will determine the success of your project in the long run. These people are an immense resource of information about how an organization works. Not how it works on paper and not how it should work, but how it actually does. If you are designing an intranet without getting your users in on it from the very beginning you are not only wasting an invaluable resource, but your project will probably fail. Why? Because there is no way it's going to match your users' expectations.

We will talk much more about identifying your users needs in upcoming chapters, both in terms of identifying the best opportunities for return on investment, and making sure that the site is usable for the people whose day-to-day jobs will rely on the intranet.