2 Elizabeth Marsh and Kate Simmons - Becoming a digital workplace leader - Intranet Now
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Elizabeth Marsh of the Digital Workplace Group and Kate Simmons of Allen & Overy talk about the the shift from intranet manager to digital workplace leader at Intranet Now, the first and only independent intranet conference in the UK.
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2 Elizabeth Marsh and Kate Simmons - Becoming a digital workplace leader - Intranet Now
- 1. Becoming a Digital Workplace Leader: the big shift from intranet management Elizabeth Marsh, DWG & Kate Simmons, Allen & Overy Intranet Now London – September 2014
- 2. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com Who we are 2 • 14+ years digital channel management across intranet/ internet. • Digital manager with particular interest in digital transformation within organisations, psychology of technology. Kate Simmons Senior Digital Manager Allen & Overy @katesimmons77 Elizabeth Marsh Director of Research DWG @digitalsanity @dwg • 10+ years intranet/ KM management at T-Mobile, Reuters. • 6+ years research lead at DWG. • Co-author: “The Digital Renaissance of Work” (2014). Curious fact… usually has a flute in her hand if on stage. Curious fact… last year completed a psychoanalytic psychotherapy course, study on-going.
- 3. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 3 9 things we’re learning about the shift from intranet to digital workplace management…
- 4. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 4 #1 Intranet at heart
- 5. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #1 Intranet at heart 5 Source: http://www.digitalworkplacegroup.com/2013/12/03/why-is-the-intranet-still-important-in-era- of-the-digital-workplace
- 6. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #1 Intranet at heart 6 In 2012 In 2014 Source: Allen & Overy 2014
- 7. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 7 #2 New opportunities
- 8. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #1 New opportunities 8
- 9. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #2 New opportunities 9 Source: Allen & Overy 2014
- 10. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 10 #3 Digital workplace manager “DNA”
- 11. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #3 Digital workplace manager “DNA” 11
- 12. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 12 #4 Intranet manager positioning
- 13. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #4 Intranet manager positioning 13 Intranet Manager Digital Workplace Manager Focus on intranet and integrated systems Broader focus across tools, people, and in some cases, physical workplace. Focus on online employee experience within the browser (intranet and integrated or linked applications on desktop and mobile) Focus on online employee experience within and beyond the browser (across applications, devices and locations) Management of intranet development or re- design projects with focus on content and design. Delivery of large scale, complex technology programmes with focus on business processes. Deeper knowledge of technical solutions. Engaging stakeholders in the intranet vision and strategy Engaging a broader set of stakeholders. Managing perception of loss of autonomy for some. Advising senior executives on digital trends and opportunities Engaging and representing the user. Championing user-centred design for the intranet. A deeper understanding of new ways of working and application of user experience principles at level of the whole digital workplace. Provide management of the intranet service. Planning, organizing and coordinating intranet activities. Provide leadership across owners of diverse systems as well as the digital workplace team. Challenging the status quo. Inspiring others. Providing ‘bridge’ between business and IT needs and view of the intranet. Becoming a facilitator between IT and the business in order to work towards a more seamless experience of workplace technology. Source: Becoming a Digital Workplace Leader: the big shift from intranet management, DWG 2014
- 14. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 14 #5 From management to leadership
- 15. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #5 From management to leadership 15 Source: Heart of England Co-operative Concert Orchestra 2013
- 16. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 16 #6 Birth of the digital workplace team
- 17. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #6 Birth of the digital workplace team 17 The digital workplace team may include management of a range of digital tools: • Intranet and collaboration platform(s) • Online meeting tools including web conferencing • Event and travel booking • Email and instant messaging • Unified communications tools • Social networking • Internal and external communities • Extranet services • Corporate website.
- 18. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #6 Birth of the digital workplace team 18 • Intranet and website management • Psychology • Social • Collaboration • Strategy • Lawyer • Business improvement • Collaboration • Broadcasting • Strategy • eBiz • Client solutions • Product dev • Collaboration • Strategy • Leadership • Tech lead • Support • Social • Video editing Head of Digital Senior Digital Manager Digital Managers x2 Digital Exec plus Assistants x4 Source: Allen & Overy 2014
- 19. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 19 #7 Making the transition
- 20. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #7 Making the transition 20 Start the dialogue/ articulate vision Make the business case Gain stakeholder buy-in Establish a steering group Focus on employee experience Leverage transformation Source: Becoming a Digital Workplace Leader: the big shift from intranet management, DWG 2014
- 21. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 21 #8 A rose by any other name
- 22. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #8 A rose by any other name 22 digital workplace manager employee workplace manager head of employee digital experience director of end user computing vice president of internal digital channels senior manager digital channels intranet & digital workplace consultant digital workplace architect digital strategist enterprise digital services manager senior manager Internal digital strategy director of workforce enablement employee engagement & collaboration manager head of workplace strategy senior manager – web & workplace strategy portal manager head of connected technologies Source: LinkedIn.com
- 23. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 23 #9 The time is now
- 24. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com #9 The time is now 24
- 25. Twitter: @dwg www.digitalworkplacegroup.com 25 END Questions over coffee, lunch…
Notes de l'éditeur
- [EM] My name is Elizabeth Marsh, I’m director of research at Digital Workplace Group and I’m thrilled to be co-presenting today with Kate Simmons, one of the pioneers of the digital workplace. [KS] I’m Kate Simmons, Senior Digital Manager at Allen & Overy, a global magic circle law firm. I’ve been a member of the DWG and previously the IBF for many years, and my career and thinking has developed alongside their research and discussions, and it’s an exciting time for both of us at the moment.
- [EM] The clock’s ticking, we could both talk for a loooong time on this, but instead will attempt to share some of the things we’re learning at DWG and in Allen & Overy. Hopefully you’ll catch us over coffee or lunch to carry on the conversation.
- [EM] intranets – and intranet managers – are still critical. But, the industry is evolving fast and whether you want to continue in intranet management or or explore new opportunities in the DW, you need to have a firm grasp of how it’s evolving.
- [EM] Many of us in this room have charted the rise of intranets from the very basic sites of the mid-90s. As the role of both the intranet and the intranet team has grown and blurred with other tools to help the organisation work more productively, we’ve often heard the cry of “the intranet is dead” and yet if anything the function and industry has grown in strength and expertise. In 2014 intranet teams have professionalised and the intranet manager role boasts a broad skill base including governance, stakeholder management, content, technology, training, user experience and adoption. The intranet is a critical component in the digital workplace. However, the term “intranet team” is becoming a limiting descriptor for many in the industry with the intranet often seen as something of a “hygiene factor”, with the team that runs it viewed as having a fairly narrow remit. In my view the intranet manager & team is in the ideal jumping off point to fundamentally step up to a much broader leadership role in the digital world of work.
- [KS] When I joined A&O in 2008, I quickly started looking at the purpose of the intranet, which was predominantly seen as a universal comms vehicle and home for static content. It was on SP2003 and so quite quickly we had the issue of a burning platform we had to replace. As things can take so long to happen in a partnership, and in large organisations generally, I had plenty of time to launch into a full scale user centric analysis project. What we realised in looking at the results of that, was that the organisation was crying out for something quite different… something that looked much more like a dynamic, personalised, digital workplace which helps them tie their roles, tasks, systems, notifications, people and ultimately their worlds together. It was enabling a level of integration of their worlds and work that we were all struggling to live out – despite knowing the ‘One Firm’ strategy and ‘not in silos’ approach was essential. This was clearly a much broader scope than just the intranet – but we started seeing a picture where these things could be driven by the intranet
- [EM] the ongoing wave of digital disruption is increasingly highlighting the fragmented employee digital landscape and as this happens there are new opportunities to design, manage and lead it.
- [EM] Digital disruption if forcing senior executives to focus on digital tools of work inside the organisation. Amidst this wave of change, integrated digital workplace programmes have started to emerge as a route to delivering a cohesive employee experience and increased business value. “Digital workplace” isn’t the only term that resonates – future of work, agile or employee experience programmes also work – but it is gaining traction. For example, Gartner and Accenture have caught on to its rise and are now using it liberally. All of these changes mean new opportunities for highly performing intranet teams to step up to help design, manage and lead in the digital world of work. In reality there are a lot more players across the organisation in any potential DW programme and intranet managers will need to take steps towards any new role or team. I quite like the way Mark Morrell puts it in a blog post on this topic, that “Instead of being the big fish in an intranet bowl think of becoming a smaller fish in a bigger digital workplace bowl.”
- [KS] So my first pitch for this vision was, i can safely say, the most badly timed pitch in the history of the world. I sailed into the boardroom hot on the heels of Lehmans collapsing, and although they got excited about the vision, the funding in the face of total economic meltdown all around us, was not so forthcoming. I got that So I used the time to focus on the analysis, and came back to them with a really robust case challenging their perception of the intranet as ‘just a back office system’ and showed how in a time of massive organisational change based on a drive for efficiencies, people needed something different – the organisation needed something different, to cohere and facilitate new ways of working. The main themes that came out of our analysis, research and elaboration added up to something that approached a space that really understands me and my needs, as well as the business needs, that really works to support me almost in the way a colleague might. This came through in various themes like (amongst others) business intelligence tools, data usage and integration with other systems in more meaningful ways – delivered in a way that really understands me, as a person… also social interaction that felt more natural and reflected my changing networks and behaviours, mobile access that again was more tailored to me… and integrated collaboration so that working with others was properly supported. This, in our new post economic crisis world, was much better understood by our board, they listened and wanted to hear more… but of course raised just as many questions for us as gave answers… such as how do you deliver and manage such a different beast to the one we had been dealing with to date.
- [EM] there aren’t many DWMs about – yet – (maybe one or two in the audience?) but they have a pretty special collection of skills and competencies that make up the DWM “DNA”.
- [EM] LI currently lists just 26 across US/UK (although of course job titles vary). And the role will vary by organisation but in research on this topic I took a detailed look at the responsibilities, skills and experience that make up the job description for the senior role of Head of Digital Workplace. The role summary references the need to cover all employee digital tools, champion a unified, human-centred digital workplace, and drive a programme of change across the organisation. It includes: Delivery of large scale, complex technology programmes Strategic thinking and planning Communicating and influencing Customer focus Leadership and creativity In brief, a pretty impressive set of skills! [KS] My role has changed beyond recognition I was brought on board as an intranet manager, with everything that traditionally entails. Never an easy job, a long list of skills involved, but my new remit and skillset I bring to the role is very different. The main thing is the level of vision setting and selling, at board level, that I now do. But the other really exciting part of the transformation for me, is that I’ve been able to bring together my external interests in psychology, psychodynamic interactions, and organisational culture with my technical, business and channel management experience. I found that in defining the digital workplace strategy, the roles were up for total redefinition and of course I had the opportunity to carve mine out to fit both the business need and my own strengths and interests.
- [EM] intranet people are broadly speaking well positioned for DW roles, but they also need to understand gaps, new skills needed.
- [EM] … especially as the digital workplace manager may come from a variety of different backgrounds - such as web, eBusiness, IT or programme management . The good news is that intranet managers already have a solid foundation in many of the skills needed in the expanded digital workplace role: from managing stakeholders, implementing governance, representing the user and ensuring alignment with strategic objectives. But they’ll also need to evolve their skillset… including: A broader focus across a range of tools, people and in some cases the physical workplace Thinking beyond the browser Deeper knowledge of technical solutions Engaging a broader set of stakeholders Advising senior execs on digital trends Challenging the status quo And so on…. [KS] Being disruptive has been an integral part of both getting to where we are now, and also as an ongoing approach within the business. I took on the challenge of stepping outside my existing remit to look at how we need to behave and what tools and technology we need to adopt in order for our firm to fully realise the value of digital… To be digital, and in fact to even just adopt the digital workplace offering in any form, required a culture shift organisationally And that required a new skillset, a deep understanding of psychology and human drives, and the way that plays out through groups and through technology usage…. which luckily for me was a passion of mine and I was at the time doing psychoanalytic training following on from working as a counsellor in a voluntary capacity over many years. Through being distruptive and combining these skillsets, we were able to challenge the way we work and the products or platforms we use by looking at the restrictions our own culture and behaviours places on us… and this meant a massive opportunity for us to be digital leaders, and digital opportunity spotters that is really helping us move on organisationally
- [EM] the shift from intranet to DW roles implies a step change from management to leadership.
- [EM] (Sorry I couldn’t resist getting a picture of my band in, with a loose connection to the conductor not just as manager but as leader). “The manager’s job is to plan, organize and coordinate. The leader’s job is to inspire and motivate.” That’s how the Wall Street Journal describes the difference between managing and leading. This distinction is important when considering the move from intranet to digital workplace manager. Bringing about and implementing a unified, human-centred digital workplace vision is fundamentally disruptive and potentially transformational – to succeed it will cut through existing silos and knock down a few ivory towers. Good management will still be needed, but leadership will also be essential. [KS] My role had to change as the nature of the way we need to work has changed… traditionally we were, like most organisations, organised in a very hierachical way… but increasingly, again like many organisations, we are being asked to operate outside of those hierachical silos… and instead adopt networking structures. In my opinion, this is full of opportunity, but on a human level, I know from my psychoanalytic study, how very hard that actually is for most people in terms of behaviours. Sticking my neck on the line and saying, actually, technology alone won’t deliver this behaviour, you really need to look at our values, our training, our support and our structures meant having to challenge, lead and be distruptive, and that hasn’t always gone down well, but it has produced movement and change and ultimately grappling with some very meaty issues of strategy and delivery that have made my role the most exciting I’ve ever had.
- [EM] the most ambitious intranet teams are making a bid to become the digital workplace team, in whatever shape or size is relevant to their organisation.
- [EM] For the intranet team, a new name can mean a new perception of the team within the organisation, resulting in a new mandate and authority to start addressing the fragmentation. As well as bringing the intranet and collaboration platform under the management of a single area (if they aren’t already), the digital workplace team may also include management of a range of digital tools. You also need to think about the ultimate home for the DW team in the organisation. Some feel this could be within a department such as comms but I think this could have a serious limiting effect on its ability to operate independently and cut through silo thinking. It should ideally sit in an independent function perhaps reporting directly to the board or sitting within a strategic transformation team.
- [KS] This shows were we have come from and where we are today in terms of structure and specialisms The skillsets we have assembled are borne out of what it is we are trying to deliver and how we believe that is best tackled. But to put this into context, we are still in the Marketing department and negotiating over whether that should be the case. It is far from all done and dusted and it is a very political discussion. However the team is working incredibly well, with a rich offering of services and products and an exciting vision.
- [EM] setting up the digital workplace programme takes a senior level mandate for change; at the same time intranet professionals need to take the initiative and position themselves for change.
- [EM] There are a range of tactics intranet teams are using to start to make the transition: Get informed on key digital trends and start a dialogue. For example, setting up an online community, presenting at key meetings, informal chats with key stakeholders etc. Don’t assume everyone will just “get it”, use visuals/ tell stories to articulate the vision. Be business rather than technology focused right from the start. Getting buy-in from stakeholders can be hard work. Get to know the perspectives of your senior stakeholders, what keeps them awake at night. Start where there’s the least resistance. Use the intranet steering group initially to promote the DW agenda. Don’t get high on technology! Talk to users, watch them work, get to know their frustrations. This will reveal opportunities where digital can improve productivity and engagement etc. All of these approaches will give you the advantage of readiness, so that you can leverage organisational transformation to move the DW agenda forward. [KS max 60 seconds] Drip drip drip has been our moto for the past year… we certainly did not have all the answers before we started putting our messages out there. It was scary but there was no way we could do this in a vacuum or without real interaction with the rest of the business. My biggest tips would be : Don’t ask for permission – just do it If we’d asked up front, we would not have the team we have today Reflect regularly and don’t be afraid of changing direction And drip drip drip your messages out there
- [EM] if “digital workplace” resonates in your organisation, use it. If different terminology – agile, employee experience, future working etc – resonates, use that instead.
- [EM] There has been some excellent debate on Linked In around the relevance of the term “digital workplace” and the use of “digital workplace manager”. As we’ve seen, the term “digital workplace” is still in its infancy, although it is rapidly gaining in usage and credence. But get to know what works in your organisation, and what there’s an appetite for. [KS] The term Intranet was becoming very limiting term for us, and certainly didn’t describe our proposition and vision going forwards. It was perceived as limited to logistical discussions, and rooted in technology. Naming our team digital wasn’t something we asked to do, we just did it. It stuck and was later officially sanctioned. We tried terminology on for size… digital transformation didn’t work so well, digital adoption and digital workplace stuck. I would encourage you to road test terms and keep reflecting on your experiences as a team.
- [EM] don’t wait for this wave of change to come to you, be proactive and seize the initiative – otherwise someone else will.
- [KS] I have felt throughout this journey, over the past 18 months, a real sense of urgency Because two years ago the business wasn’t quite ready And in two years time we will have missed the boat and someone else will have done it But RIGHT now, there seems to be just enough stability and yet still enough instability with the organisation and markets to make this a real moment in time… where the space is up for grabs, the problems are identified but the answers are not… where decision makers intuitively know this is important and unresolved and are open to someone leading them to a solution. [EM] We’re so inured to statements like “the accelerating pace of change” and “exponential growth” that we often ignore their very real implications. A quote from former Intel CTO, Justin Rattner, brings this home: “If you think the past years of digital revolution were pretty amazing, think again. The next 40 years will blow you away, and will make the past 40 years look pretty tame.” With that in mind, the time for intranet managers to seize the opportunities to advance their careers and their teams is now. After all, if professionals in our industry don’t take the initiative then someone else in the organisation, whether from HR or Facilities or IT, will. At DWG we see strong continuity in the need for excellent intranet managers, and it’s a choice about whether to continue to excel in intranet roles or make the leap to the digital workplace. Ultimately, it’s up to you to define the path that resonates most strongly for you.