Claromentis Intranet Software Blog

We have seen video files used in several areas within Claromentis intranet systems – here are some examples with comments.

1. The corporate talking head. This is common in certain more corporate Marcoms solutions - where departments see these are a way to get the management story across in a more friendly way.

2. Training videos. We have manufacturing customers that use videos to show agents and distributors how to perform various hardware tasks - highly effective. Pictures here really do speak a thousand words. Especially if the audience is not always English speaking.

3. Software training - short animations of people using the software demonstrate how to perform various tasks. Becoming easy to produce and very low cost.

There are some problems, in my opinion, with use of videos on corporate intranets.

For example a user will get very irritated once they have seen any talking head animation more than once. So the idea of promoting a departmental home page using a manager discussing the departments goals and contributions is fine – providing it does not play unless I click on it. Before it plays – I should see something else in its place. In general this is a good example of where the phase 1 system might need replacing with phase 1.1 very soon after launch!

In general this idea of “information before I play it” can be extended – it is much better to have a gateway page describing and cataloging videos on the intranet – preferably using universal metadata as used in Claromentis to optimize relevancy and speed of searching – so that a user is well informed before they select a video to watch – rather than surprising them with possibly irrelevant animations on an otherwise useful resource.

Similarly make sure the files are optimized and delivered for fast access. In fact – some useful media files need no image at all – for example on people profiles why not have an audio clip from the user about their interests and current activities – or perhaps in global corporations have an audio file of how to properly pronounce their name. Effective, personal and simple.

General Intranet Posts, People and Cultural Issues, intranet applications intranet, multimedia files

I posted an article on my personal blog today, and then I thought that perhaps a similar discussion should be on the company blog.

In summary I was commenting that clients often don’t give nearly enough emphasis to the effort involved in actually creating content - deciding the appropriate delivery mechanism for each type of content - and to getting that content moved across to the new solution.

It is as if there was some kind of time lag - they seem concerned whether intranet vendors like Claromentis have some technical feature, whereas it is almost always the case that not only do we have it, we now have multiple solutions  for the same requirement – and the client needs to invest time in deciding which one to use for each business need.

We now offer a service to actually migrate intranet information to the new Intranet solution – Claromentis – and we should encourage all new clients to consider this service to maximize their intranet projects chance of success. The solution we offer provides business consultancy, technical delivery, content migration and documentation to ensure intranet projects have the maximum chance of achieving the desired return on investment – in an acceptable time frame.

Corporate News, People and Cultural Issues intranet content

We have talked a lot about project success factors, what company expectations should be – how these can be phased, how intranet return on investment can be measured.

But at the end of the day we sometimes don’t pay quite enough attention to the individual employees of the client that have a role to play – as a general advocate – or as departmental editor/content generator.

At a personal level these people need to be engaged with, planned for, mentored, coached and trained. They need to have what to us are relatively basic concepts – like permission dialog boxes – demonstrated and explained until they are very comfortable. When that is achieved they are more than capable of pushing their department forwards.

Sometimes, on both sides – the intranet software supplier and the client – the individuals a level below true system administrators, but those who really understand what is important to make a departmental area more efficient – get poor attention in our shared excitement to deliver against client management goals. But these are the foot soldiers that make things happen in intranet projects, and we should recognise that and encourage their informed participation.

General Intranet Posts, People and Cultural Issues intranet software

I spent a couple of hours with a potential new customer yesterday – and I had a lot of sympathy for their situation.

They really resent their current intranet supplier, to the extent that they are seeking approval to move to a new intranet technology partner in the next budget cycle.

This is despite the fact that they have many thousands of pages and files to move across - they still feel that the account management approach, and indeed the software functionality with the existing supplier has just broken down so far as to be impossible to continue.

It is so hard for new clients in this situation – to be reassured the new relationship with Claromentis will be better, and that the information migration will be dealt with. As our technology increases so very fast, it is no longer about what we can do – but how can we do it? How can we prove that we are  the best intranet supplier to work with ?

Well – it is fun trying!  Because we honestly have the aspiration to be the best intranet supplier around. But I can understand this companies fear completely – it is the natural worry that they will move ‘out of the frying pan into the fire’.

To help customers in this situation we now offer an intranet content migration service, which takes place as soon as the proof of concept is signed off and delivers all the deep structure, menus, content, document sand interfaces needed – before the upgrade to the full commercial license.

Corporate News, General Intranet Posts, People and Cultural Issues changing intranet suppliers, intranet content migration service

I am currently working at a client site for consultancy work. This morning I came to the client site and spent a frustrated hour cleaning up my mailbox, as I have yet again reached my email quota, and could not send any more emails before I do some cleaning up.

So I set up a small rule for myself. Sort by subject, and if there are any attachments, delete everything by the latest one, that way, hopefully I would end up with the “latest” version…

It never ceased to surprise me how large companies (and my client is one of the largest blue chips in the world) still do not take advantage of Document Management software or Online Collaboration tools. The irony is that these companies bought various tools and software, however they are disparate, IT driven, too complicated to setup, and ended up not being used. And people end up with the frustration of losing files, version confusion, same document duplicated all over the network, and full mailboxes..

General Intranet Posts document management, online collaboration

Two weeks ago I was visiting a new customer in Atlanta, and next week we  go back to the USA to train another new Intranet client – this time in San Francisco - ahead of the main launch at a trade show later in the month.

The approach we use in delivering intranet training on these longer visits is becoming standard in the sense that we now completely prioritize a generous amount of flexible agenda. We do this for two main reasons:

1.    We know the staff will be under pressure to deliver their real work while also attending the training.

2.    We know individuals will react to the system at certain times with a real sense of the potential for their role or department – and we need to be able to explore that properly to make sure the business value is identified, and training time is allocated on the fly to make sure the project can react.

But in addition – we frankly know from experience that the first time you go from a proof of concept to a full training workshop we will meet a whole new set of interests and challenges that the initial client specifications did not cover – and we need to reserve time to make sure we can respond.

Overly detailed planning of our intranet training agenda would just prohibit the exploration of these very important aspects which often contain true insights on where the value is for the real users.

Claromentis around the world, General Intranet Posts, People and Cultural Issues intranet training, intranet value

Take it to the CVS Pharmacy of course!!!

They stock everything you need to get the CVS back on track

CVS = Concurrent Versions System - it’s the platform that we manage our core developement on

General Intranet Posts america, atlanta, humor, technical

Various companies spend huge amounts of money, time and effort to get the best of breed intranet applications, and end up with the headache of maintaining them. Information is stored in silos, and extra effort (and cost!) has to be spent in order to allow information to be shared between one application and another.

In contrast, a relatively modest investment in the Integrated Claromentis Intranet Platform ensures that disparate business information is stored in a single integrated and extendable data model, which allows common data to be shared by various applications. On top of that, additional bespoke applications to provide specific business need can be built within the same model to ensure a coherent business focus application environment.

General Intranet Posts, intranet applications extranet, integrated data model, intranet, intranet applications

With the release of the Project management application, Claromentis now offers a complete solution for the construction sector to manage their construction intranet and extranet projects.

This includes :

• Document management
• Java based fast searching for large data volumes
• Web based project management
• Document commenting
• Extranet access for construction partners
• Web based project management including Gantt charts

This solution is fully available on Linux and Windows.

General Intranet Posts, Intranets by Industry Sector or Job Role, intranet applications construction sector intranets, extranets, intranet software

Babcock simplifies policy management and improves employee communications with help from Claromentis.

Babcock Case Study

With a client list including the Ministry of Defence and local authorities as well as major private sector companies, Babcock Infrastructure Services (BIS) manages over 15,000 properties across the United Kingdom. Part of Babcock International Group PLC, the Company services nationwide contracts both directly and through subsidiary joint ventures Debut Services (South West) Ltd, Babcock DynCorp Ltd, and mouchelbabcock education.

Reed the full version of Babcock Case Study.

Clients, Communities and Case studies, Corporate News, General Intranet Posts Babcock, Case Study