6 ways to create an intranet your frontline workforce will love

The employee intranet is a critical piece of the employee engagement puzzle. It keeps your workforce on the same page, supports the easy sharing of information and resources, and serves as a valuable tool to support internal communications, HR, and IT functions.

But historically, employee intranets have been developed with a desk-based workforce in mind, creating a gap in the workforce tech experience for frontline employees — the vast majority of the global workforce.

It’s a gap that these deskless employees are keenly aware of: Just 10% of frontline workers say they have enough access to the tools, tech, and opportunities they need to connect and advance in their workplace.

This lack of access is often a result of two simple reasons: Most intranets are 1) designed for a desktop computer experience and 2) accessible only through a corporate email address — two things that many frontline workers don’t have or use on a regular basis.

To overcome these issues, organizations sometimes try communicating with their frontline workers using memos on a noticeboard, SMS messages, or shadow IT. Yet this just furthers the disconnect, with desk-based workers getting a rich digital workplace experience — and frontline workers still missing out on all the benefits an employee intranet brings.

With frontline satisfaction and retention in need of urgent attention, a modern intranet, suited to all sectors of your workforce, can transform the frontline employee experience.

Let’s look at six ways that organizations can customize their intranet to make it more frontline-friendly. By incorporating these ideas into your own intranet, you can give your frontline employees — alongside your office staff — the communications, connection, and resources they need to thrive in the workplace.

6 ways to customize your intranet for the frontline

#1. Make all tools and resources accessible in one hub

Frontline employees work busy shifts with limited downtime. If they have to switch between lots of different apps, remembering multiple sets of login details, they’re unlikely to regularly use your workplace tools.

By putting everything your workforce might need in a centralized employee app, your frontline workers can benefit from quick and easy access to key tools and resources.

An employee app, accessible via smartphone or desktop computer, can act as a content hub where all policies, documents, and forms are stored. It’s where employees can catch up with company news, connect with coworkers, and fill out the latest employee surveys.

With the help of single sign-on technology, a company app can also act as the gateway to all other workplace software, improving adoption of tools across the business. Employees need to sign on just once to access anything from training programs and shift-swapping software to time-off policies and employee benefits.

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#2. Create different channels to satisfy all employee connection needs

While it may not take place around the famous water cooler, office-based workers get lots of opportunity during the work day for informal chit chat. But frontline employees — who often work disparately, away from HQ and on their own — tend to miss out on coworker connection. This can create a disjointed employee experience and get in the way of knowledge sharing, team building, and collaboration.

So when it comes to the company intranet, don’t just create channels for important company updates. Create channels suited to informal conversation and two-way communication, too.

Here, employees can get to know one another and chat about their choice of topics. They can enter groups, building relationships with co-workers in the same location, in the same role, or with the same hobbies. By providing a variety of communication channels on your employee intranet, you satisfy the various connection needs of your workforce.

#3. Use mandatory reads to highlight important communications

Some frontline employees work in environments where safety and compliance are critical. Others interface with customers and need the most up-to-date information on inventory and processes. But these workers don’t always call into HQ before their shift starts, and they sometimes operate with less direct supervision than their office-based peers.

So how can you ensure critical updates get through to your deskless workforce?

By marking the latest policies, safety alerts, and best practices as mandatory reads on your intranet, they’re more likely to cut through the noise. 

Mandatory reads appear prominently on the intranet dashboard or the company news feed. They only disappear when an employee reads and acknowledges them. And by using backend analytics that track engagement and reading rates, your internal communications team can ensure that all workers, regardless of their locations, have received and read new need-to-know information.

#4. Surface personalized content based on teams and titles

If you primarily use your intranet for your desk-based workforce, it likely contains a lot of information that is irrelevant to your frontline teams. Serve this information to your frontline employees and they’ll become disengaged with your intranet, making it harder for you to communicate key messages.

Use intranet tools that allow you to personalize the user experience — and don’t simply make a distinction between your office and frontline staff.

Segment your employees based on their title, team, location, and tenure. Then customize their dashboard so it features the most relevant content. For frontline employees, you might like to include key contacts, “suggested for you” content, and news related to the frontline.

Similarly, when employees access the company news feed, they should see content relating to them and their roles. You can achieve this by selecting the audience for each post — whether that’s the whole company, your office staff, your frontline workers, or a particular team.

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#5. Make it easy for managers to recognize great workers

A third of frontline workers say that a primary reason for leaving their position is feeling undervalued by their employer. Yet despite the role of workplace appreciation in engagement and retention, less than half of workers said they had received recognition from their organization, leaders, or peers in the previous month.

Frontline managers are well-placed to offer praise but — like the people they lead — these managers are busy, feeling like there are barely enough hours in the day. To build recognition into the frontline employee experience, make it easy for managers to tackle through an employee intranet with built-in rewards and recognition features.

By providing ready-to-go templates, managers can easily but meaningfully personalize and post messages of recognition to a company news feed or a group chat. With just a few clicks, managers can show appreciation for hard work, highlight successes, or celebrate an employee birthday.

Highlight employees on public channels within your intranet and recognition will take on a life of its own. Coworkers and other managers can like the post and comment with their own words of praise, amplifying the post’s impact.

The fewer steps involved in employee recognition, and the more visible you make it, the more likely it is to become an integral part of company culture.

#6. Analyze intranet data to identify gaps and opportunities

A modern intranet is more than just an information hub — it’s a way to capture, measure, and analyze employee engagement rates. It also allows you to segment data by division, location, and more criteria to unearth more granular employee-level insights.

By examining intranet engagement data for your frontline workforce, you can build a clearer picture of which strategies are working — and which could be improved. Also, consider using employee surveys to ask your frontline about their intranet experience. You may discover points of friction and reasons why employees aren’t using your intranet.

With these data-backed insights, you can make targeted and informed decisions about how to customize your intranet to maximize frontline employee engagement.

A frontline-friendly culture can be built on the intranet

While standard intranets don’t always work for a frontline workforce, there are ways to customize your employee intranet so it meets the needs of everyone.

Personalize your intranet experience so its content and chats are more relevant to frontline employees. Give your dispersed workers recognition and coworker connection opportunities. Above all, make your intranet easy to access and use via a mobile app.

By doing so, you’ll make your intranet more engaging — and provide a reliable source of information and connection for all employees.

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