Waterstone’s, Admiral and Republic Amongst Winners of the Annual Interact Intranet Awards

14th October 2011 – Interact announced the winners of its 2011 intranet excellence awards at an exciting awards ceremony in central London last night.

Sweeping the board was leading bookseller, Waterstone’s who were presented with two first place awards from James Robertson, MD of intranet consultancy, Step Two Designs. Their intranet – Compass, won Best Return on Investment and the overall award of Best Intranet, thanks to its powerful mix of communication, collaboration and business processes that made it stand out from the rest.

Nigel commented:

“Waterstone’s were a deserved winner of both awards due to their outstanding intranet functionality. The ‘ASK HR’ feature has significantly improved efficiency in HR and their eForms have enabled them to include all 3,000 employees in real time feedback. We also paid them special recognition for achieving the huge task of eradicating all emails to stores and directing them through their intranet.

“In terms of ROI, Compass provided a huge 50% time saving through its innovative ASK HR tool and eradicated 200 emails a day from their IT support desk. They minimised store-to-store emails through online forums and have replaced spread sheets with forms and workflow.”

Ayesha Graves collects her award from James Robertson

Ayesha Graves collects her award for Best Intranet from James Robertson, MD of Step Two Designs

 

Romec were runners up in the Best ROI Category for their massive savings of £1.2 million through actual, employee time and green savings. American Golf claimed third prize by showing that after 6 months of using Interact Intranet, they had re-paid the total cost of the intranet by removing the businesses reliance on the email system.

Best Launch Strategy:

UK Asset Resolution were awarded first place for their extensive intranet launch strategy, which included testing the concepts and the pre-launch teaser campaigns, to a competition to name the intranet which also included an incentive to donate £1 to charity for every user profile that was completed. Vale of Aylesbury Housing Trust (VAHT) took second prize thanks to their themed launch day to introduce their intranet to staff with branded merchandise and entertainment. Group Gwalia were also commended and took third place thanks to their treasure hunt competition designed to get users familiar with the many tools in Interact Intranet.

Best Employee Engagement:

This was awarded to Admiral for the numerous features they had launched to retain staff engagement, including international online chats with senior managers and a widget which gives all employees the opportunity to ask questions to the CEO. North East Derbyshire District Council showed how critical an intranet can be for staff morale through change and uncertainty with the looming public sector cuts and were awarded second place. Financial Ombudsman Service were awarded third place following the great success they saw from their strategy of planting teasers about the intranet and letting their forums go ‘viral’. Their ability to engage staff through a number of features including live chats, blogs and the suggestions showed the power a social intranet has in engaging employees.

Best Intranet Design

Republic claimed the Best Intranet Design award thanks to its ‘one-click’ infrastructure and the clever incorporation of the white ceramic title wall in the design. The judges also loved the competitive element of the departmental homepages in terms of layout, content and use of design. Yodel grabbed second place for showing the judges that the fresh and inviting design of the intranet echoed the organisation’s new brand values and enticed staff from the two merging companies to unite and collaborate. Mosscare Housing came in joint third place as they were commended for their ability to produce a clever intranet infrastructure with limited funding resources and BCS The Chartered Institute for IT also came third for utilising seasonal design’s.

Best Intranet Manager

Jennifer Mills from The Mileage Company was awarded Best Intranet Manager for her dedication to designing and launching her intranet, she was praised for championing the intranet as the sole tool to unite the globally expanding business. Second place went to Ayesha Graves, from Waterstone’s for taking the intranet from being a ‘nice to have’ to being a central communications tool and Malcolm Payne, of American Golf was awarded third place for his dedication to the governance and development of the American Golf intranet. His work to constantly update the design of the intranet to coincide with the activity taking place within the business ensures it is kept alive, operational and interesting.