3 Keys to a Successful Intranet Implementation

As the Manager of Client Services here at HospitalPortal.net, I serve as the main project manager for most of the Intranet and Policy Manager implementations. Here are a few tips that I have picked up from my experiences working with our clients that could greatly help in the rollout of your upcoming Intranet project.

Governance Group

Depending on the current or previous state of your Intranet or internal communication tool(s), implementing a new Intranet can be quite a daunting task. To help address all of the moving parts and keep everything on schedule, you will definitely need an internal project manager at your hospital, in addition to the project manager on the vendor side. Even with an internal, dedicated project manager, there will still be a lot of items to keep organized. It is a good idea, necessary even, to establish a Governance Group (a group of 5-10 individuals representing different departments) to help drive the project. Not only will this governance group help take some of the responsibility off of your internal project manager, but the PM should be able to lean on them for feedback and other input for ideas on how the new Intranet will be structured, how it will look, and how it will function.

Site Map

Since you’ve already decided to move forward with implementing a new Intranet, you probably have either a good idea of what you don’t want based on your current experience with internal communication and information sharing, and/or have a solid idea of what you do want to do moving forward. In either case, you and your team should start thinking of a site map fairly early in the process. You may need to wait until you get some type of training first to see what the system is capable of before you can really get into figuring out what tools you want to implement and where. However, at these early stages, you can start organizing your thoughts on what type of information you’d like to publish on the Intranet by developing a preliminary site map of how various pages will likely be set up.

Go-Live Prep

As a project manager on the vendor side of things, a common spot that I see some hospitals get hung up on is the Go-Live Prep. It’s very easy once the training and/or implementation is complete for the scheduled Go Live date to take a back seat to the day-to-day work or other projects. A conscious effort needs to be made in order to prevent having to scramble to get everything set up a week or two before your Go Live date. Ask your vendor for a Go-Live checklist early-mid implementation process. Ask for periodic updates from your internal team members you have tasked to organize the policies and procedures. Hold weekly meetings to check in on the various department managers so they are making a consistent and diligent effort to build the content on their pages and staying in touch with their teams’ progress. Finally, make sure you’re checking in with the vendor throughout the implementation process (especially prior to Go Live) to make sure you’re not missing anything – remember, you may only go through in Intranet implementation once or twice in your career; they do it for a living and can offer a lot of best practice guidance and tips along the way.

Interested in learning more? Watch our free webinar on Policy & Procedure Management software implementation. Policy and Procedure Management for Healthcare