How strong is the link between strong internal comms and intranet maturity?

Without staff most organisations would cease to function.

Without communicating to staff what they need to know, organisations cannot function effectively.

That's one of the reasons why staff communications tools - including intranets - are very important.

However communicating with staff is generally not as exciting as making big budget television commercials, as this very amusing video from ABT illustrates.

I've often wondered about the strength of the relationship between an organisation's commitment to internal communications and its commitment to an effective intranet. I have worked in organisations with strong internal comms cultures, but with very poor intranets.

Has anyone seen any research on this?

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Online engagement - learning from the private sector

A few months ago a PR agency representing the National Australia Bank (NAB) made a series of comments on AFL blogs advertising NAB services.

This incident has been discussed in publications such as Marketing Magazine, NAB spamming: maybe it's time to take dance lessons and Crickey, NAB spams blogs to spruik its SMS banking, which confirmed that the approach was endorsed by the NAB. From the Crikey article,

NAB media relations spokesperson Felicity Glennie-Holmes confirmed that the message was indeed from the bank. The idea to spam the comments sections of private blogs was a recommendation of PR agency Cox+Inall, part of the BWM group, and had been undertaken by Cox+Inall with the bank’s full knowledge and approval.

Cox+Inall had searched for blogs that included AFL coverage and were “well-enough read to attract readers who might be interested in our offer,” said Ms Glennie-Holmes. No-one at NAB or at Cox+Inall had considered approaching blog owners first for permission before posting their promotional messages, she said.

“Blogs are a public forum”, said Ms Glennie-Holmes. NAB and Cox+Inall felt this meant commercial interests could feel free to contribute unsolicited and irrelevant commercial material as comments, placing the onus on blog moderators to reject or delete unwanted comments.

Crikey's article went on to point out that the NAB had a strong anti-spamming message on its website, which did not seem to apply to how the bank chose to engage with others.


The incident has created a great deal of concern across the blogging community and a number of people I have spoken have lowered their view of the NAB.

An example of the backlash is this Youtube video looking at how NAB would feel if people came onto NAB property to advertise their own services. It's cheap and grainy - but the point is clear, respect the rights of others in their own spaces.

Bloggers have also contacted NAB directly to complain about this incident and a recorded interview was published online, as reported by Better Communications Results, StewArtMedia and NAB’s comment spam.


What can be learnt from this
I believe there are a couple of things communications professionals can learn from the NAB's experience.

Understand the channel and medium before engaging
The view of the NAB was that blogs were public forums, available for commercial comment.
In this case I feel that the NAB did not initially build a strong understanding of the online channel and consider how the medium of blogs actually function.

While blogs are available publicly, they are usually owned by a single individual and operated in a highly personal way. Just as people would take offense if an advertiser came into their home and started talking to their family and friends about a commercial offering, blog owners are proprietory about their blogs and need to be approached and engaged in an appropriate way.

This applies equally for an situation where an organisation engages with someone else's online property - be it a blog, forum or chatroom.

It is important for the organisation to take the time to understand the appropriate ground rules for the venue, consult appropriately and engage with the full agreement of the site operator.

Respect others
Respecting others is part of the social 'glue' that holds civilisation together. By stepping into someone's space and shouting a message an organisation, or individual, can be demonstrating a lack of respect.

While the internet is a public service, and blogs and forums publicly accessible, they still have rules of engagement - just like a public event.

An organisation seeking to engage within the online medium needs to spend the time observing to understand the social rules and codes of conduct before diving in.

This demonstrates respect for others and demonstrably changes the reception the organisation will receive.


Online engagement must add value
In this case the NAB posted commercial messages unlinked to the discussions taking place in the blog.

There did not appear to be any planning or thought around building credibility with the audience or adding value with the comments.

For organisations engaging online it is not sufficient to rely on the branding and established reputation in other mediums. Organisations need to think about what they bring to the forum or blog and what value they add to the conversation.

An organisation that provides adds value to the online conversation (speaking with), rather than advertising (speaking to) will build credibility and gain opportunities to communicate its message in more engaging ways - thereby being more successful.

Use an honest voice
In the NAB incident, a PR agency posted the comments - and they were posted anonymously, not as an official representation of the NAB.

When engaging online if you want to be taken seriously as an organisation you must represent yourself as who you are. Use an honest and real voice, advertising agencies can only take you so far, organisations will achieve far greater credibility and cut through if it is an actual representative of the organisation making the posts, using their true voice (not pre-processed PR statements).

This is very hard for organisations to understand, given the formal nature of engagement in other mediums - the best example is to think of the online channel as talkback radio and engage accordingly.


In conclusion
Thre's a lot of material available in print and online discussing the right and wrong approaches to online engagement. Most of it follows the same general theme as my points above, understand the medium, be respectful of others, add value to the conversation and use an honest voice.

Take advantage of this when developing your online engagement strategy and you'll avoid many of the mistakes organisations first face when making a decision to use the online channel actively.

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Weekend viewing - The CIO vision series, a recent focus on Commonwealth government agencies

As a business professional in the online space I have always found it important to grasp the views of our IT colleagues to help us work with them more effectively.

If you have some free time over the weekend, ZDNet's CIO Vision series is well worth reviewing.

I've been watching the series for a couple of months now, particularly the recent interviews with the CIOs of ATO, Centrelink, Defense and Customs.

The private sector CIO interviews through the series are also very insightful.

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Lessons to be learnt from the Grocery choice website

The last few days have seen a number of media reports criticising the new Federal government Grocery choice website.

Amidst the noise there are several key takeaways for public sector website managers.

Note that I'm not involved with the Grocery choice website or program. I'm commenting from the perspective of a public sector web manager who needs to meet the same level of scrutiny for the sites I manage.


What is Grocery choice?
The purpose of the grocery choice website, in its own words, is to provide practical grocery price information to help consumers find the cheapest overall supermarket chain in their area. It does this by publishing prices for typical grocery baskets across supermarket retailers in different areas of Australia, updated monthly.

The website was launched on 5 August this year, at the same time as the ACCC Grocery Inquiry report was released.


The main criticisms of Grocery choice
Putting aside politics, criticism has fallen into several areas;

• Accessibility - whether Grocery choice is usable by vision-impaired people, as reported in the Brisbane Times, Grocery price watch website under fire,
  
• Usefulness - whether the information is sufficiently timely to be useful for consumers, as reported in the Daily Telegragh, PM's Grocery web of deceit,
  
• Channel choice - whether the online channel can reach the appropriate audience, as in the ABC's report, GroceryChoice criticism: Seniors 'don't use' internet.

What should government website managers take away from this?

• Accessibility is crucial - failure to meet the government minimum standards can place your organisation at risk.
  
  
• Usefulness is a function of both information and presentation - web managers need to consider how to best present and explain information and services within the capabilities of the online channel to convey maximum meaning and understanding.
  
  
• Select channels based on desired outcomes - web managers need to be able to convey an understanding of the online channel's capabilities and advise other managers when it is the most important channel, a supporting channel or should not be used.

Unpacking the takeaways

Accessibility
Accessibility is a legal requirement for government agencies. Compromising website accessibility, whether due to tight deadlines or changes in design or requirements, can expose a government agency to legal action and should be considered as a risk in any web project.

On that basis accessibility is a very important area for government website managers to understand and manage. Government agencies are required to follow the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 (WCAG 1.o) developed by the W3C in 1999 in meeting the Disability Discrimination Act 1992.

This is detailed in AGIMO's Web Publishing Guide within the Accessibility section.

The minimum standard for a government website is an 'A' rating, with 'AA' rating recommended (personally we're gradually shifting our agency websites to 'AAA' level). There are some great tools available to analyse sites to ensure they meet the standard, such as the VisionAustralia web accessibility toolbar and, as I've discussed previously, a list of tools from AIM.

Web managers should also note that the W3C's update to their guidelines, WCAG 2.0, is nearly here. There are already a useful reference on how to meet the WCAG 2.0 guidelines available from WIPA.

The criticism of Grocery choice is clearcut - if the site doesn't meet the 'A' minimum level then it does fail to meet Australian government standards and this needs to be addressed as a priority.

If it remains unaddressed then legal action is possible, similar to the accessibility court case around the Sydney Olympics website, well described and documented by Tom Worthington.


Usefulness
Does the website serve a useful purpose? Does it provide relevant, timely and usable information and/or services for citizens and customers.

This is something all web managers should be considering when building or developing websites.

In meeting the goals of a government agency web managers need to consider the needs of multiple groups of stakeholders and audiences. We also need to consider the capabilities of the channel itself - online is not the best channel for every engagement.

In Grocery choice's case the debate has centred on whether the information in the site - which is published monthly - is useful to citizens.

This is a debate with two sides, Choice magazine, as quoted in the Livenews article, Grocery Watch is a great tool: Choice, has expressed that they believe the website is of use, whereas other commentators has said that monthly basket data is not as useful as visiting the local supermarkets.

The information is collected as part of a set program, over which I would expect the website manager has little control.

However I think the site manager has done an excellent job of presenting this information in a useful way, and explaining the collection process such that website visitors can make their own determinations of the usefulness of the data.

The presentation and organisation of information is often the area over which website managers have the greatest influence in helping make a website more useful for citizens.

The value of information or services can be greatly enhanced - or greatly diminished - through presentation and all website managers need to have a firm grasp of how to best use the online channel to maximise this value, even when they have no control over the information itself.


Channel choice
The specific debate in ABC's article (mentioned earlier) is related to claims that seniors cannot benefit from the Grocery choice information as they make limited use of the online channel.

Online has always been a controversial channel as not everyone chooses or is able to use the internet. For example it has higher barriers to entry than other mass media - you need to purchase a computer and pay for an ongoing ISP account. Television, radio and print media have a lower upfront investment and shallower learning curve.

Despite this, internet has been adopted in Australia much faster than radio, television or print media. Industry reports are fairly clear that both television and print readership are declining. The advertising industry are also very clear that 18-35 year olds are very difficult to reach via other media, as has been discussed in ABC's The Gruen Transfer.

So therefore online is an important and growing channel - but is not a universal channel.

My experience has been that ]in management there are internet 'bulls' and internet 'bears'. The first group seeks to use the internet wherever possible, is more supportive of the channel and more inclined to fund online initiatives. The second group is still cautious of the internet, is more dismissive of whether it is used and how it is used and is inclined to use traditional channels.

Effective website managers need to steer a middle course, advocating use of the channel where appropriate, and advocating the use of other channels where not. They also need to ensure that other managers understand the capabilities of the online channel so that good channel choice decisions can be made.

The primary goals of organisations generally involve reaching, communicating and engaging with customers and stakeholders - providing what is needful and supporting the conversations necessary to make improvements over time in an effective and cost-efficient manner.

On this basis the channels selected are less important than the outcomes achieved.

I personally remain mindful of this, and believe other web managers should also.


Did you have other take-aways?
I'd appreciate comments from other web managers regarding the takeaways they've had regarding the Grocery choice media coverage.

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Should government regulate mobile data? The EU thinks so

I regard mobile internet access as of strategic concern to Australia's development as a connected nation.

While fixed wire broadband is also crucial, mobile access is the best approach for filling the gaps cost-effectively in a large low-population nation such as Australia. Also mobile internet supports ubiquitous instant access to information, which fixed broadband does not.

This is why I felt it important enough to write a blog post regarding the cost of data in recently released Australian iPhone plans.

As such I have found Paul Budde's article, Regulators expose data roaming rip-off, very interesting.

In it Paul discusses how the European Commission has chastised telecommunications companies for their mobile data charging practices. This is because the large prices being charged are actively inhibiting the growth of mobile internet use in Europe and having flow-on long-term economic impacts.

To quote (bolding is mine),

Data as charged per MB also remains excessive: in most countries (with the notable exceptions of the Czech Republic , Malta , Hungary , Latvia , Poland and Slovakia) charges fell between June 2007 and March 2008. Nevertheless, in four markets (Iceland , Luxembourg , Poland and Slovakia) the retail charge per MB is above E10. According to the GSM Association (GSMA) the average price for downloading a MB of data is now just over E5.

Lack of transparency remains a serious problem, in that most consumers are unaware of prices for data roaming or of the amount of data being used. This in turn has led to the ‘bill shock’ which is proving to be one of the principal brakes on customers using mobile data roaming.

The article concludes with details of the charging regime in Denmark which highlights the level of overcharging of consumers by telcos in the data space.

I can appreciate that telecommunications providers are using data charges to offset falling fixed line voice revenues. However at some point this becomes an economic brake and of national concern.

I only hope that this occurs sooner rather than later in Australia - I believe that we have already seen economic damage due to the broadband drought - although I am not aware of any report ever having been commissioned to assess the opportunity cost of high broadband costs in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

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