Use these guidelines to create an effective, user friendly online information exchange system.
Every agency needs to distribute information to employees so that they can do their jobs effectively. Access to current and correct information is becoming more critical. As your agency grows and adds staff, the problem of keeping employees informed becomes increasingly complicated.
In the past, a standard way to disseminate information to employees was to photocopy the information and put it into each person’s in-box. One of the problems with this approach is that you can’t find that one piece of information when you need it because it’s buried in a stack of paper. One of the best solutions is an agency intranet.
An intranet provides an improved way to share information within your agency. It’s actually a Web site that’s designed to display information needed by the agency’s internal staff. Although an intranet uses Internet technology, it’s basically a collection of documents that reside on your network.
An intranet offers a number of advantages in managing your agency information:
- Common Access. All documents are read using a Web browser, which provides an easier and more intuitive way to manage and display any type of information. Your staff is already using a browser to access information on the Internet. They can use the same method to access information specific to your agency needs.
- User-Friendly Navigation. As with any Web site, an intranet allows you to create links between different documents, Web sites, or specific Web pages. This means that your staff can navigate through a large number of documents without having to know where the files are physically located on your network. As your system becomes more sophisticated, you can add user-friendly search engines to help your staff find the specific information that they’re looking for quickly.
- Reduced Training. Because there are fewer software programs to learn, new employees will get up and running quicker. Everyone looks for information using the same tool (a Web browser), which reduces the amount of training and support needed.
- Low Cost. A basic intranet is a low-cost investment. A few people in your agency can create an intranet quickly without a great deal of planning and expense. Your intranet also provides a way to begin to develop a more sophisticated presence on the Internet.
- Easy Updates. Keeping information current becomes far easier. Instead of making the changes in the document and then photocopying it to pass around the office, you can make the changes to the original document and everyone in the office will have the updated information automatically. Because everyone is viewing the same document, when changes are made, everyone will have access to the new information.
- Simplicity. Like a collection of documents on a network server, an intranet gives you and your staff the ability to save files, content, and information in a central location where everyone in the office can find, view, and modify it. This type of resource allows you to start small to get your feet wet. It can grow as you find the time and the need.
Information that should reside on your intranet includes:
- Procedure manuals and departmental workflows
- Agency handbook and employee benefits descriptions
- Company-specific notices
- Marketing campaigns with details on new packages and programs offered by your carriers
- Contact directories for your underwriters, claim adjusters, and anyone else you need to contact at a carrier
- Vendor contact information
- Specific carrier Web site addresses (hyperlinking enables you to click on the name of the carrier and be taken directly to their Web site)
- Links to other Web sites, such as trade magazines and rating services
- Commission schedules
- Vacation schedules
- Such internal forms as vacation requests, time sheets, supply requisitions, etc.
- And, anything else that you’d normally distribute to your staff in paper format
A quick way to determine what information should go on your intranet is to walk around your office and look for paper documents that are tacked or taped to the walls. All of those documents are candidates to be put on an intranet.
Creating an intranet is surprisingly inexpensive, and setting up one is easy. The Microsoft Office package provides a detailed set of tools that allows you to publish Word documents or Excel spreadsheet files to your intranet. It might also be helpful to purchase Microsoft FrontPage, a tool for creating Web pages, to help you with the design and layout of your internal site. Although this program isn’t necessary, you’ll find that it makes designing your intranet easier so that your staff will be able to navigate more easily and find just the document they’re looking for.
The FrontPage program offers a user friendly method of laying out your internal Web site that includes more sophisticated graphics, navigation, and hyperlinking tools. As you learn how to build your first site, these tools will also help you to manage your Web site with little or no assistance from outside professionals.
CONCLUSION
An intranet will provide an electronic file cabinet that contains information your employees need to access. The list of documents that can be included in an intranet is limited only by your imagination.
Virtually anyone who can use Word and Internet Explorer can create a basic intranet for his or her agency. Doing so will substantially increase efficiency by allowing access to the information that your staff needs to service and to sell.