We are all looking for ways to measure the value of an intranet. Intranet managers often ask me how other organisations do it. The issue has been explored in the Global Intranet Strategies Survey since 2006, by asking some basic questions about indicators and techniques used.
We classified indicators into 4 categories:
- Soft - subjective and qualitative aspects such as increased employee satisfaction with the intranet
- Hard - objective measurements such as cost savings, decreased resources
- Quantified soft - combination of soft and hard, for example time saved converted into monetary value (dependent on agreement that the time saved does truly represent cost savings for the organisation)
- Derived - metrics using data from other enterprise or business systems such as sales reporting data studied before and after a sales portal is implemented on the intranet
One thing that is clear is that organisations with the more advanced intranets (in Stage 3 for example) measure more than the others:
- The Global Intranet Trends for 2009 Report shows that from 70 to 80 percent of all 3 stages use "soft" indicators.
- Stage 3 leads in the use of "hard indicators" (55 percent, compared to just over 30 and 20 percent for Stages 2 and 1 respectively).
- Stage 3 also leads in "quantified" at just over 30 percent, followed by Stage 2 at just over 20 percent and Stage 1 just under 10 percent.
- "Derived" are the hardest to conduct, and all 3 stages are at a similar low level under 15 percent.
The IBF team have made a significant step forward in designing a systematic approach to the question of intranet value. The IFVB (Intranet Financial Value Benchmarking) is designed to help organisations identify both the cost of the intranet and the value it brings to the organisation. It highlights both exploited and unexploited values. It is based on a full view of looking at all the functional and business areas of the organisation and includes different types of indicators.
The model was developed with financial analysts and some of the IBF’s member organisations including BT whose intranet manager Mark Morrell will be participating in IntranetsLive next Tuesday May 5th. He will be talking about how BT used the IFVB to highlight both areas of current value and new areas of potential value to explore. The IFVB model uses time-saving and increased productivity figures ("quantified soft") as one of the major types of indicators, but places them in a context that also includes "hard" indicators as well as some "derived indicators".
We intranet people know intuitively that a well-designed intranet helps people save time, thereby work more productively. However, this belief will not necessarily be shared by high level budget holders who may not have personally experienced the satisfaction of finding the right person to answer your question in seconds, or the frustration of spending a hour searching for a document and never being sure to have found the right version. The global approach used by the IFVB model, organised by function and business activity, gives more strength to the time-saving figures by placing them in a business-oriented framework side by side with other figures including process streamlining, savings in travel costs and real estate through remote and mobile working, and more.
I highly recommend tuning into IntranetsLive next Tuesday, May 5th, to hear what BT has to say about IFVB. More information here. You can get a first time visitor's pass if you are not a member.
(IntranetsLive is the monthly online intranet event created by IBF and followed by intranet managers around the world. IFVB is a service that can be purchased by members and non-members of IBF)
Unfortunately, I won't be online next Tuesday, as I'll be in Philadelphia at the JBoye event, but would love to hear from any of you on how you have gone about evaluating the value of your intranet.
Have you ever done a study on ROI?
If so, what types of indicators did you use?
Any specific point you'd like to see developed in this year's Global Intranet Strategies survey around the ROI issue?
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