One size does not fit all!

Corporate intranet applications such as CRM systems, information portals and internal directories can offer tremendous promise. These applications can be anything … they can do anything. 

Do you have a complex business problem - you can make an app for that! 

By neglecting this potential, many organizations set their standards too low when it comes to internal applications. Far too often shortcomings are met with make-shift work arounds in order to ‘just get the job done.’ Companies should not accept mediocrity simply because an application lives on its intranet rather than on the internet. 

Would you accept a suit sized too large in the shoulders and too narrow in the hips from your tailor simply because your clients were not going to see you wear it? Custom intranet applications should adapt to the way your company does business not the other way around.

“Custom intranet applications should adapt to the way your company does business not the other way around.”

Three Ways to Make the Most of Your Intranet Apps

1. Make Your Employees the Experts - Creating internal focus groups among users is a good place to start. Often, those who use a system day in and day out have the best insight on how to improve operations and optimize efficiency. In addition to identifying where to start, these key users can also provide invaluable feedback during beta testing suggesting changes and improvements to internal applications.
2. Focus on UX (User Experience) and UI (User Interface) - Is the user-interface clear and well planned? Thoughtful consideration of the overall user experience combined with a finely-tuned, intuitive user interface can make all the difference in the world when it comes to adoption, usability and longevity of an internal application or service. Boiled down, a Good UX equals success. 
3. Be a Broken Record (If you have to be) - Intranet applications are blank slates - they can be anything. The danger in being able to be anything is that you become a little bit of everything and end up doing nothing.

Some applications prove difficult to use because they have been burdened by contradictory decisions offered by a variety of stake-holders during the development process. Appointing a singular department as project lead and adhering to a clear primary project goal are important to staying on budget and delivering a winning application.

Be a broken record (if you have to be), relentlessly questioning each feature or change request, asking “Does this change move us toward our goal? Does it help? Does it hinder?”