6 new reasons to love DWG’s research programme
The Digital Workplace Group is delighted to announce the topics for its upcoming member research programme for 2016.
For over ten years DWG’s expert research programme has been trusted by DWG members to deliver focused insights across both intranet and digital workplace good practice. Topics are guided both by DWG’s unique insight into the industry as well as member priorities in the year ahead.
The range of topics this year is quite diverse: from measurement to user experience (UX), knowledge management (KM) to understanding digital workplace maturity, and from Office 365 to getting personalization right. Together these comprise some core areas of intranet and digital workplace practice, building on the current library of around 60 reports.
Here are the six topics that have been selected:
- Measuring the digital workplace
Intranets have traditionally suffered from a lack of measurement due to unavailability of appropriate tools and/or inconsistent approaches to gathering and analysing data. DWG addressed this challenge in what has proved to be a very popular report that set out an approach for successfully tackling measurement.
In the digital workplace the measurement challenge is even more complex. In this research we will examine how progress and performance of digital workplace initiatives can be measured meaningfully, providing insight to stakeholders and helping to drive the strategy.
Related research:
- Measuring Intranets: A guide to intranet metrics and measurement – download the executive summary
- Digital Workplace Business Case – download the free full report
- The Digital Renaissance of Work: Delivering digital workplaces fit for the future (Chapter 14)
- Setting up a user experience programme
Focusing on UX is clearly associated with successful digital workplace initiatives, and yet many practitioners still face resistance to investment in a user-centred approach, with UX often viewed as a “nice to have”.
Yet research has shown that investing in usability can result in bottom-line benefits through factors such as improved user satisfaction, faster finding of information and expertise, and increased productivity.
This research will explore ways to introduce a more user-centred approach to the intranet in your organization.
Related research:
- Developing a User-centred Information Architecture – download the executive summary
- Digital Workplace User Experience: Designing for a flexible workforce – download the executive summary
- The Office 365 intranet
Office 365 is Microsoft’s fastest growing commercial product ever. Recent research found that 48% of organizations are already using it and an additional 15% planned to in the next year. A high proportion of DWG members are using, or planning to introduce, Office 365.
Following on from our popular SharePoint reports, this research will take a deep dive into the benefits of Office 365, the challenges and opportunities it presents, critical success factors – plus look at leading examples of practice in large organizations.
Related research:
- DWG SharePoint reports: 2007, 2010 and 2013 – download the SharePoint 2013 executive summary
- Intranet Platforms: A guide to understanding the landscape – download the executive summary
- Getting intranet personalization/customization right
Most new intranet implementations deliver targeted content based on user profiles and many allow users to further customize their experience. Targeting content in this way helps to increase relevance/usefulness and filter out “noise”. Targeted content can include news, events, links, collaboration sites, tasks, search and navigation.
This research will explore the factors needed for successful personalization and customization, as well as the benefits organizations are realizing from targeting content.
Related research:
- Managing Content: A good practice guide – download the executive summary
- Digital Channel Matrix: Creating employee-focused internal communications – download the executive summary
- Knowledge management in the digital workplace
Originally established as a discipline in the early 90s, knowledge management practices have evolved and matured in the intervening years, despite claims that “KM is dead”. Sharing, capturing and managing knowledge is often a key driver for digital workplace initiatives, with collaboration at the heart of many programmes.
This research will explore the role of KM within the digital workplace, as well as new opportunities it offers to manage and leverage intellectual assets.
Related research:
- The Art of Collaboration: Optimizing online collaboration for success – download the executive summary
- Successful Social Intranets: Creating business value through strategic alignment and adoption planning – download the executive summary
- Understanding digital workplace maturity
In 2016, DWG celebrates five years of the digital workplace industry pioneered by DWG CEO Paul Miller. As part of its thought leadership on this topic, DWG developed and implemented a model to assess both the “what” and the “how” of digital workplace maturity.
In this research we examine early findings from DWG digital workplace maturity assessments and how to apply the insights extracted to your own digital workplace journey.
Related research:
- From Intranet to Digital Workplace: How to evolve your strategy – download the free full report
- Digital Workplace Fundamentals: The integrated approach – download the free full report
As always, the DWG team is incredibly excited to see the launch of the new programme. DWG’s Managing Director of Member Services, Nancy Goebel, says: “Managing intranets and digital workplaces is growing increasingly complex. Thanks to direct member input about their most pressing challenges, DWG is launching a 2016 research programme that will deliver a collection of evidenced-based white papers that deliver innovative thinking, actionable insights and real-world examples that will help accelerate efforts and deliver tangible results.”
Also commenting on the programme, DWG’s Director of Research, Elizabeth Marsh, says: “DWG research is a unique resource in the industry. Our members tell us it helps them drive their intranet and digital workplace programmes, validate decisions and get up to speed quickly. We have selected these topics in close consultation with members and the new papers will help them in areas they find challenging, as well as further enabling them to be thought leaders in their organizations.”
What members say about research
“It’s great to see intranet best practices from real-life examples. Also, DWG provides a lot of explanations to help support their recommendations. I’m constantly searching for tips and guidelines on the internet for ‘intranet best practices’, but what I find is that there’s no data to support those recommendations.” Tiffani Crawle, Digital Reporting & Analytics Consultant at The Coca-Cola Company.
“Our default position is always to check the research library first and if there’s something relevant to what we’re doing there, we start with that.” Matthew Beckett, Digital Specialist, Intranet at Schroders.
To join organizations like Adobe, BT, The Coca-Cola Company, IKEA, Johnson & Johnson, UK Parliament and Verizon, who are already benefiting from DWG research, contact Nancy Goebel, Managing Director, Member & Benchmarking Services to learn more.
References:
Categorised in: Research reports
