Top 10 Intranets 2013

A free translation of the article by Jacob Nielsen and Kara Pernice about the top 10 intranets in the world in 2013 and trends in the development of such solutions - " 10 Best Intranets of 2013 "



A year ago, Jacob Nielsen, who traditionally seeks to make work on the Internet for users as convenient and accessible as possible, conducted research in the field of intranets and identified key trends that will occur in the coming year. This study showed that 70% of winners use heavily customized SharePoint . Among the main trends identified is an almost twofold increase in the number of the development team, a number of advantages: improved integration with social networks and numerous advanced filters.

It seemed to us that this study was not widely used, and we decided to fill this gap and discuss with you whether the trends that were spoken about by the Nielsen Norman Group happened.



Recall, the company Nielsen Norman Group annually holds a competition of intranets, the results of which determine the top 10 best intranet portals.



So, the top 10 intranets for 2012

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In most cases, these are full-fledged intranets that take into account the specifics of the company's activities and satisfy the needs of all departments of the organization. And only two of the top ten intranets have highly specialized functionality: AT & T offers its employees “first line”, a special knowledge portal, and the Luzerner Kantonalbank intranet is open to consultants of the bank’s clients.



The best intranets of 2013 are created in six industries.







By the number of winners, the insurance sector has been leading for two years in a row.



Winners of 2013 are residents of 7 countries







The Saudi Commission for Tourism, Historical and Cultural Heritage is the first winner from the Middle East. The rest of the countries have already “delivered” the winners to the top.



The success of the countries for the duration of the competition







Given the size of the country, the most impressive are the successes of Switzerland (7.9 million people or 2.5% of the US population).



And now let's look at the key trends identified by the Nielsen Norman Group in January of this year.

Trend number 1. It takes several years to create a good intranet.

According to the study, the average duration of creating an intranet (from idea to full implementation) is 3.5 years . It took about 27 months to create each of the winning intranets, which is about 2.3 g.

Trend number 2. Small companies dominate among the owners of the best intranets

Every year, smaller and smaller companies become owners of the best intranets. For example, in the study, most winners have fewer than 5,000 employees. Seven intranets are served by less than 5,000 employees, one company created its own system for 6,000 people, the highest rate for AT & T (127,000 people) and the smallest for Acorda Therapeutics (350 people).



The average number of employees in the winning companies in the last 5 years







Perhaps two years of research is not enough to report a trend, but data suggests that creating a good intranet is becoming easier , and therefore such systems are now available to smaller organizations that have fewer resources.

Trend number 3. Intranet teams are growing

The teams working on the creation and implementation of intranets within companies are growing . On average, up to 27 people work on the winners' intranets. The largest team in AT & T - 107 people . Today, the share of intranet specialists in the total number of employees of the organization is 0.14%, that is, 1.4 specialists per 1000 employees. Last year, this share was only 0.07%.



Growth of intranet service groups,% of the total number of employees, 2001-2013







The study showed that to create a good system that is able to motivate employees and increase productivity, we need the appropriate personnel and there should be a lot of them. Designing, developing, writing texts, managing the system is simply not fair to require these small teams to perform these tasks.

Trend number 4. Third-party consultants are actively involved.

Six out of ten winners of the intranet creation involved external companies, and most of them are companies developing on SharePoint. Third-party agencies and independent consultants are helpful in solving highly specialized issues that are not regular for the company.

Trend number 5. Content creators are attracted already in the early stages.

Attracting employees from different parts of the organization in the early stages of developing an intranet is the practice of the best teams. If until 2013, in the early stages of design, employees' requirements, opinions and wishes were mainly collected, in 2013 content creation was added. Thus, experts can get rid of unnecessary content, edit existing materials, optimize the produced solutions.



Quality content is the most powerful motivator for intranet users: they come for information.

Trend number 6. Development of functionality and design

Among the notable functional and designer trends developing in recent years, the following can be noted:

• mega-menu; ( http://www.nngroup.com/articles/mega-menus-work-well/ )
• video channels;
• extended employee profiles;
• personalized main pages and sections.

This year, new trends have been added to these trends:

• Corporate streams from Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other social resources on the main page of portals or in news feeds (this trend is particularly well represented in the intranets of Acorda Therapeutics, Inc. and AIG).
• Advanced content filtering (good examples can be seen in the XL Group, Luzerner Kantonalbank, AIG, and AT & T systems).
• Possible actions in the search results of people (Ono, Luzerner Kantonalbank, and Acorda have interesting solutions within this trend).

Trend number 7. Falling interest in mobile versions

Only one of the winners has an iPAD-adapted version of the intranet - from AT & T. The “mobilization” of internal systems is stagnant - in 2009, the optimization for mobile devices experienced three intranets from the top, and in 2011 this figure increased to six.



Typical obstacles to the development of mobile versions of intranets:

• safety and security of data
• difficulties with choosing a platform
• lack of resources required for the design and support of mobile versions,
• Difficulties with the selection of a set of functions (a complete solution or an application for specific tasks).

In our opinion, these trends are obvious and have a place to be. I wonder if you agree with this and hear your opinion.