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The Irish Computer Society is delighted to introduce the first ICS Intranet Report. The response to this initiative from ICS Members and the wider IT professional community has been impressive and has enabled us to generate a comprehensive overview of intranet activity in Ireland. We believe that this is an important piece of research which has highlighted some significant findings particularly in the areas of intranet usage amongst staff and future trends for the proliferation of the medium. As an organisation the ICS is committed to providing relevant and useful services to our members. Research initiatives like this offer a valuable insight into IT activity in Ireland and enable the Society to clearly convey the opinions of Irish IT professionals at a national level. This is the first of three annual intranet surveys that the ICS will oversee in the coming years. By tracking results year to year we will be in a better position to gauge trends in the company intranets area. In addition, more company focused questions are planned for future surveys, which will further elucidate on the findings of this first report. I would like to express my gratitude to Amárach for their professionalism in administering this survey and to pTools for their generosity in sponsoring the initiative. Finally, my thanks go to all those IT professionals who took the time to complete the survey.
Jim FriarsThis research for the Irish Computer Society by Amárach Consulting is both rare and original. There is very little information available about the nature of intranet in Ireland and the fact that access to individual intranets is so preciously guarded adds even more value to the result. The detail provided by participants is striking and gives real insight into the varied and complex nature of intranets in use in Ireland today. Intranets typically fall within one of six levels of maturity, namely; Information Sharing, Self-Service, Collaboration, Enterprise Portal, Application Dashboard, and Consolidated Workplace. In Ireland intranets are well along this maturity path and collaboration is a major driver. That said delivery of applications through intranet and use of intranet as an application workplace remains to be more fully achieved and the developments indicated will no doubt move intranet along this path. Almost all participants, 86% said intranet is set to become much more important in the near future. The range of organisations participating represents both large and small, public and private, new and established. In most instances, 80% intranet is controlled here in Ireland. It is clear also that the IT department maintains control over intranet and intranets have been in place for a number of years with several revisions taking place over time. The influence of Microsoft technologies on document formats, operating systems, database technology, and search is significant and is broadly 2:1 compared to other systems. There is a difference between Microsoft based intranets and other systems across a range of software tools and features. While a great variety of tools and features are available, document management, contact management and e-learning are consistently present. There are tools for staff collaboration such as announcements and document sharing but little delivery of tasks through intranet. Both in-house and proprietary content management technologies are used in equal measure. Detailed tracking of staff or department use of intranet does not take place. Accessibility compliance is low at 20% but major improvements in this area are planned. Google is used on a significant number of intranets, 28% but Microsoft technology is also used for intranet search. Almost 60% believe that staff do not take advantage of what is available on intranet and 67% said there is no benchmarking of intranet against industry standards. As a microcosm of the various encounters between global technology players, intranets in Ireland offer interesting insight into a number of areas including Microsoft and Oracle, Microsoft and Google, as well as new areas like Web2.0, Accessibility, and Staff Management. Establishing trends in these and other areas will be the basis of further research. I am delighted that pTools Software has been able to sponsor and support the initiative, and equally pleased with the response from participants and the results achieved.
Tom SkinnerThe target group consisted of over 2000 individuals selected from the Irish Computer Society membership and the wider IT professional community. The survey was conducted by Amárach Consulting and will form a comprehensive report to be published later in the year. The ICS Intranet Ireland 2006 Report is sponsored by pTools™ Software.
Despite the specialist nature of the subject matter, there was nevertheless a high level of response - with 218 fully completed responses to the survey by those responsible for managing intranets in their organisations. Although some findings confirm generally held views of intranet activity, other results indicate technology preferences and patterns of development that suggest considerable change in intranet policies and practices.
The survey was based on a representative sample of companies and organisations ranging in size from fewer than 50 employees to more than 250 and covering public and private sectors.
Participants answered a range of questions covering intranet usage, technology and development plans. Almost 9 in 10 (86%) of intranet managers indicated that in the main, intranet was controlled by the business in Ireland. Respondents indicated that the IT department maintained a high level of control, with half (53%) indicating that IT 'mostly controls' intranet and Internet-related developments in their organisations.
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Also in terms of control, usually the Human Resources Department had influence over intranet and the Marketing Department had influence over Internet- related developments.
In relation to intranet technologies, Microsoft Operating Systems were more likely to be used than Unix based systems - with a 69% / 31% usage incidence respectively. There was a similar prevalence of Microsoft SQL Server over Oracle in relation to database applications.
The relationships between operating system and database and other technologies showed a pattern across Search, Document Management, Content Management and other applications and software tools. Detailed information was sought in regard to intranet features and tools used by participants and results show a diverse use of many applications from document management to eLearning.
Staff announcements and management information scored highly, with 76% and 43% respectively having these features on their intranets. The delivery of staff tasks and the assessment of staff usage featured less frequently with incidences of 18% and 26% respectively.
In the area of Accessibility, 78% of participants indicated that no rating existed for intranet or that they did not know of such a rating. However 42% indicated that Accessibility was an area they intended to upgrade in the near future.
Further research will be undertaken in 2007 to build on these initial results and to further clarify technology and usage patterns for intranet in Ireland.
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A significant number of participant organisations had been in business for more than 20 years with over 75% in business for 3 years or more. Although no information about public versus private sector was gained this result would indicate that government and large scale orgainisations featured strongly.
With less than 25% of participants indicating a workforce of just 25 or less, and with over 45% indicating a workforce of 250 or more, the survey included many larger and more established government and private sector organisations.
Although no direct inference can be drawn between the prevalence of intranet and the location of organisations, it was notable that 34% of participants indicated they had only one office location while the combined remainder, 51% indicated they had 3 or more office locations.
86% of participants indicated that they had control over intranet development and related decisions here in Ireland with just 14% indicating overseas influence and control.
Intranet is deployed normally for all staff and where it was deployed to individual departments both IT and Management staff featured in these deployments. Notably, Research & Development, and Business Analytics were listed as 'Other' departments. How staff without direct access to intranet are handles may form part of further research.
The results of this question were broadly in line with the numbers of staff indicated in the organisation however the results here would indicate that less staff use the intranet on a daily basis than are working in the organisation. This may naturally be accounted for by the fact that many employees are not at a desk or logging on to the intranet as part of their normal daily work. However some of the larger organisations seem also to provide intranet to only a small number of staff on a daily basis. Further research is needed to tease out the reasons for this.
The results indicated that Microsoft Office documents were the predominant format available to download from intranet. However on examination of those participants selecting 'Other' it could be seen that OpenOffice documents running on Linux also featured. Notwithstanding this PDF was the most used format for documents accessed.
Only 7% of those responding indicated that the intranet was in first phase development with almost 50% indicating that intranet had been revised and re-developed more than three times since inception.
A significant number of organisations, 18% said they had developed and revised intranet deployments more than 5 times.
Perhaps an indication of the overall sophistication of intranets is the fact that 58% of participants indicated that applications are not launched from intranet. While participants who indicated the use of MS operating systems showed a slightly greater tendency to launch applications from the intranet, this tendency was reduced for other operating systems. A similar pattern can be seen in relation to database technology.
There was an absence of tasks and messaging integration within intranet overall, with 81% of those responding indicating they did not use intranet for this purpose. It is hard to estimate the relationship between this and overall sophistication of intranet but some integration of task and messaging functions would be typical of more advanced systems.
While Document Management, Management Information, eLearning, and Contact Management lead in terms of tools featured on intranet, there is a wide take up across all tools listed. Furthermore the small number choosing 'Other' tended to list additional features rather than software tools.
Staff announcements and organisation memos show significantly in features available on intranet. Classifieds ads also feature and it was notable that a number of intranets seemed to have no features other than simple page information available.
In terms of participants choosing 'Other', the many additional features listed include: department and task specific documentation and forms; events; blogs, wiki's; org charts; phonebook; project management; press clippings; weather forecasts; staff biographies; car park booking; people finder; menu's; bus timetables; IT helpdesk; vacancies; policies and procedures; competitor and customer profiles; staff and product directories.
Accessibility compliance results indicate that it is not a priority in regard to current intranet deployments. 19% indicated that no accessibility compliance existed and 59% indicated that they did not know what accessibility compliance existed if any. This left just 22% indicating that a level of accessibility compliance was in place.
When comparing operating systems and levels of accessibility there was a notable difference between intranets running on Microsoft environments and intranets running on Unix environments.
Intranets running on Microsoft environments tended to have less accessibility compliance, with the predominant response showing no accessibility compliance.
Intranets running on Unix environments tended to have more accessibility compliance, with the predominant response showing AA or 'Level 2' accessibility compliance.
42% of those responding indicated that they planned to upgrade accessibility compliance in the near future. While a similar number, 43%, said that they had no plan to improve the situation with 14% not knowing if any plan for improvement existed. This would suggest that as many as one third of those organisations with no accessibility compliance had no intention of putting any compliance in place.
Both HTML Editing and Content Editing featured strongly in skills involved in intranet development and support. Not surprisingly Database Administration and Application Programming also featured. However the significance of Graphic Design, with almost the same number of people employed in design as in programming is striking. To understand this fully may require some further research. 'Other' skills listed included System Administration and CSS development.
More participants listed Microsoft SQL as the internet database technology used at 31%, than listed Oracle, MySQL and DB2 combined. Microsoft SQL was twice as likely to be the database used as Oracle at 14% or MySQL at 12%. This said, a large number of participants (24%) indicated that they did not know what database was used on their internet. Within those listing 'Other' there was a mix of technologies including Postgres and Lotus Domino. A number of participants indicated that no database technology was used and this may correlate with the relevance of HTML editing referred to in other parts of the survey.
61% of respondents indicated that they used Microsoft operating systems and 17% indicated that they used Unix operating systems. This figure of 3 to 1 combined with a number of other results may be seen to indicate a preference. Furthermore the prevalence of Microsoft Sharepoint as a portal technology would seem to be a strong influence on overall intranet system environment. Although those selecting 'Other' indicated a range of technologies including Linux, there was also reference to Apache on Windows. More research is needed to understand the significance of these results.
When comparing operating systems and database technology it was notable that more organisations had Oracle deployed on Microsoft environments at 55%, than on Unix environments at 45%.
Autonomy/Verity was used for internet search by 9% of those responding, 28% said they used Google. Those listing 'Other' showed a variety of in-house, open source and other technologies but also significant reference to Microsoft technologies was made as the basis of search within the intranet.
When comparing operating systems and search technology there was a small but significant tendency for intranets using Microsoft environments to choose Google as the preferred search technology, while intranets using Unix showed a preference for Autonomy/Verity as the preferred search technology.
Equal numbers of respondents 42% in both instances, indicated that they used in-house and proprietary Content Management Systems, with 16% saying they did not know the specifics of the CMS used. The actual CMS technologies referenced were again influenced by Microsoft operating systems and portal technology environments.
IT dominated in terms of control of both intranet and Internet. In addition HR had increased influence over intranet while Marketing had increased influence over Internet. Among those selecting 'Other', there was reference to Corporate Communications department outside of Marketing andHR with significant influence on both intranet and Internet.
There was a three way split between respondents when asked to assess the level of importance of intranet compared to Internet. With 37% stating intranet was more important, 30% stating intranet and Internet were equally important and 33% stating intranet was less important.
50% of those responding said there was no tracking of intranet usage by individual within the organisation while 35% said individual usage was tracked. Only 18% indicated that department usage was tracked, with 61% indicating it was not tracked and the remaining 21% not knowing either way. When compared with operating systems, individuals on intranets with Microsoft environments were slightly more likely to have their usage tracked than those working with Unix or other environments. When compared to size of company, the larger organisations showed a small but significant increase in the level of department and individual user tracking on internet.
50% of those responding said there was no tracking of intranet usage by individual within the organisation while 35% said individual usage was tracked. Only 18% indicated that department usage was tracked, with 61% indicating it was not tracked and the remaining 21% not knowing either way. When compared with operating systems, individuals on intranets with Microsoft environments were slightly more likely to have their usage tracked than those working with Unix or other environments. When compared to size of company, the larger organisations showed a small but significant increase in the level of department and individual user tracking on internet.
Almost 60% of participants felt that individual employees were not taking full advantage of intranet. Also when this figure was referenced against the size of organisations it was clear that larger organisations thought that employees were not taking advantage of intranet to a greater extent. In this instance, 80% of organisations with 200 employees or more said full advantage was not taken. More research is needed to discover exactly why larger organisations are experiencing this level of negative perception of usage and adoption.
67% of participants indicated that they did not benchmark their intranet development against any other organisation. Only 10% said they did use benchmarking and 23% said they did not know either way. Comparing that 10% who did use benchmarking with other results it could be seen that they were predominantly larger organisations, with higher numbers involved directly in intranet support. These organisations were also more likely to have a level of accessibility compliance.
86% of participants indicated that intranet will become more important in the near future. Only 1% of participants felt it would be less important and the remaining 13% felt it would be neither less or more important in the future.
The Irish Computer Society was founded in 1967 as the national body for
Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Professionals in Ireland. In
recent years its development of numerous special interest groups, known as the
ICS Networks, has extended the remit of the organisation. The Networks offer
ICS members a forum for learning, networking and accessing support. In 1997 the
ICS founded ECDL Ireland, now known as ICS SKILLS to provide and promote a
recognised international standard of computer literacy certification in
Ireland. The success of ICS SKILLS is reflected in the uptake of its most
widely recognised programme, ECDL (European Computer Driving Licence). Over 6%
of the Irish population has received an ECDL award, internationally the highest
per capita rating.
For further information visit www.ics.ie and
www.ics-skills.ie
Established in 1998, Amárach Consulting is recognised as Ireland's leading
specialist in consumer and business research. Amárach have considerable
experience spanning a wide range of sectors, methodologies and subject areas.
As well as offering full market research services, Amárach also specialise in
economic analysis, forecasting and business consulting.
For more information, visit www.amarach.com
or call 01 6605506.
pTools™ was formed in 1997 as Parallel IT and is based in Dublin's central
business district. The company uses pTools™ Enterprise Content Management (ECM)
software to develop and manage content management solutions for intranet,
extranet and Internet systems for a wide range of corporate clients in the
private and public sectors in Ireland and the UK. The software combines
powerful functionality with a user-friendly content management interface.
For more information, or a demonstration of pTools™ ECM software, visit
www.pTools.com or call 01 6789311