8 things to think about when measuring Digital Workplace performance

As if measuring intranets wasn’t hard enough, now you’re trying to get the Digital Workplace programme off the ground and the measurement challenge just got that much more complex.

But help is at hand. It’s something we cover in ‘The Digital Renaissance of Work – delivering digital workplaces fit for the future’ co-authored with DWG CEO Paul Miller, and I’ve pulled out a few pointers here.

Sadly, the reporting around internal digital tools and services is still generally immature relative to, for example, CRM data used for the management of external clients. Hopefully the recognition that investment in the digital workplace is core to the wider transformation of the organization should help drive this maturity – only time will tell.

Establishing key success criteria and a measurement framework for the digital workplace programme against which you regularly report is essential and failure to give appropriate attention to this can lead to stakeholder disengagement and either a lack of investment or withdrawal of funding.

In reality, making direct links from the digital workplace programme to financial value or increased productivity can be complex and hard to prove. A holistic set of measures will be required that include quantitative and qualitative inputs to demonstrate how the programme is supporting organizational goals and realizing value.

So on to those thinking points…

1. Tracking KPIs against organizational goals, overall programme progress and individual project status are essential to the digital workplace programme.
   Unilever’s approach to measurement for their Agile Workplace programme is a great example, with a range of measures that cross over the digital and physical workplaces. Their targeted set of measures include Agile Certification for individual sites (which includes technology effectiveness), a Global Agile Scorecard (with measures such as use of telepresence rooms, and staff awareness and training) plus overall programme statistics (such as productivity and environmental impact).
2. The work done early on to align the digital workplace programme to business objectives will highlight desired benefit areas and drive the selection of KPIs.
   In Chapter 11, on making the business case, we highlight potential areas of benefit – such as cost optimisation or increased productivity – that can emanate from the digital workplace programme depending on its scope and purpose. Having a clear understanding of the desired benefits will be essential, not only to the strategy, but also in order to implement meaningful measurement. In short, what is it you’re trying to do? And what metrics will help you understand if its working and how to do it better?
3. A range of metrics should be measured to provide as broad and complete a view as possible.
   A broad and complete view is needed in order to avoid drawing the wrong conclusions from just one or two measures. For example, measurement for a digital workplace initiative that introduces collaboration may include number of communities created and used; number of complete profiles (i.e. including skills and expertise); reduction in number of emails sent with attachments within team; and potentially a reduction in time to serve customers due to a support community. Getting a holistic view will also help to avoid (even unconsciously) ‘cherry-picking’ metrics that support a particular view.
4. Tracking overall programme performance requires a clear baseline, a desired end-state and a framework against which progress can be assessed.
   In Chapter 10, on understanding your digital workplace journey, we set out a heuristic tool to assess the current state of your digital workplace on areas such a ‘communication and collaboration’ and ‘mobility and flexibility’. Tools like this or DWG’s full Digital Workplace Maturity Benchmark can help to provide a baseline for the programme – indeed clients often use our benchmarking as a before and after measurement for intranet and digital workplace implementations.
5. Individual projects relating to specific capabilities and functionality, or rollout to specific areas, functions and locations need to be measured.
   Within the overarching digital workplace programme, individual projects and initiatives (whether around particular technologies or relating to specific functions or locations) will need to be tracked with an appropriate set of metrics. A core set of metrics which you supplement as needed will make it easier to identify any trends and highlight success stories or identify underperformance. As new services are rolled out this will include implementation metrics such as employee reach/ coverage, user satisfaction and the availability/ uptake of training.
6. Using success stories – both inside and outside the organization – can be a powerful way of demonstrating outcomes and gaining ongoing engagement and support.
   Dry facts drive most of us into a state of boredom. The smartest intranet and digital workplace professionals find engaging, as well as useful and relevant, ways to use metrics to demonstrate success – both inside and outside the organization. These may include success stories, well-designed dashboards, automatically generated reports or visualizations. Success stories can demonstrate adoption in specific parts of the organization (helping to overcome resistance in others) and they can help to model the desired behaviours relating to the new tools.
7. The digital workplace is never ‘finished’ – a constant process of research and iteration is essential to keep it up to date and relevant.
   Alongside the collation and analysis of appropriate metrics, organizations need to continually evolve the digital workplace programme as new needs become apparent and innovative technologies available. An iterative approach will be the lifeblood of the programme as it matures and becomes embedded into daily work processes. IBM is perhaps one of the best examples of this with their 20 year journey from basic corporate news site to IBM Workplace and a restless energy that means they continually look for ways to move forward.
8. Metrics must evolve as the programme matures and develops.
   As the lead for your digital workplace measurement programme, I’m afraid that your work is never really done. Over time, and as the programme matures, the KPIs and metrics that underpin measurement will also need to evolve. Certain measures may be relevant at the outset (for example, before and after implementation) but less effective or relevant over time. It is also important to look at how particular measures or scorecards may be built into the performance management structure. Linking particular measures to bonuses or performance records can send the message that digital tools and associated behaviours are critical to successful performance at an individual, team and departmental level.

I also recommend good, strong coffee before you get started.

How are you tackling the challenge of implementing meaningful measurement in the digital workplace?

Elizabeth Marsh is Director of Research at Digital Workplace Group and recently co-authored ‘The Digital Renaissance of Work: delivering digital workplaces fit for the future’ with DWG’s CEO, Paul Miller. She has over ten years of experience across intranet and knowledge management roles in leading organizations. Elizabeth tweets @digitalsanity