Verizon is a big, big communications company. In fact, about 140,000 employees spread mostly across the continental United States. If the challenge of communicating with all those people is not enough, most of those employees, about 80,000, are what you would call traditional “offline” staff including call center staff (online but not connected to all tools) and field workers such as service, repair and central office staff.
Verizon’s biggest challenge therefore is bridging the ‘digital divide’ of those with access and those without. The answer: break down the digital divide by creating the ‘digital workplace.’
More than just the intranet or home page, the digital workplace is the new place to meet and do business. The Digital Workplace is Verizon’s “umbrella” term for all online systems, tools, information channels regardless of geographic location for “anytime, anywhere access to the information and tools employees need to get their jobs done.”
At the heart of the digital workplace of course is the intranet portal, eWeb. But the key to success that is driving much of the visible added value are some of Verizon’s cutting edge communications tools.
Voice Portal
Voice Portal is a voice recognition portal service that allows voice-activated access to intranet functions and information using any telephone. The information accessible through voice portal includes:
• intranet information
• jobs
• mandatory training
• employee directory information
The portal can be accessed from any phone. For example, the employee dials the phone number of the Voice Portal – yes it has its own number – and then simply instructs the voice system by saying, for example, “call John Smith in Dallas, Texas.” The system recognizes the request and speaks back the answer. Voice Portal will provide options or choices if there are multiple listings (e.g. “do you want the John Smith that works on Main Street?”).
Voice portal also allows employees to send e-mail by voice. The employee phones Voice Portal and dictates their e-mail and the system then sends a dictation of that message to the end user’s e-mail inbox with a .WAV audio file. Not surprisingly, usage of this voice portal has sky-rocketed particularly amongst employees who travel or commute a lot. The voice portal even allows the user to phone in and get the latest job postings or training modules!
On the flip side the portal also allows the user to check all of their messages including voice mail and e-mail through a single online Message Center (via the PC). Not surprisingly the portal allows employees to receive and initiate calls through their computer, or to route calls to other phones such as their home number. The Message Center also allows for instant messaging and conference calling.
Collaboration
Verizon has all of the collaboration tools most organizations would dream about – new and old including:
• Webcasting
• Video on demand
• Online forums
• Wikis
• Blogs
• Instant messaging
• eMeetings
• Web conferencing
Despite their availability for years, many organizations have never implemented discussion forums, or have given up on them. They do take work. Verizon’s Digital Workplace (DW) features 40 self-regulating forums (authentication and names required). Self-regulated meaning employees are empowered with the responsibility of their own posts; Verizon doesn’t have the staff nor time to monitor all posts. Despite executive fears of profanity or brazen language, there the forums have never been a problem even in such a large organization.
“We’ve never had a single problem in the 4.5 years it’s been active,” says Verizon’s Donna Itzoe, Digital Workplace Communications Manager, during the Intranet Insider World Tour featuring the Verizon Digital Workplace (presented by Communitelligence.com). “We’ve never had to remove a single post.”
Of course, making employees responsible for their own actions and posts frees up the DW team to focus on other priorities – such as social media tools. This past summer (August 2007), Verizon launched employee wikis on the intranet. Ten in all have been launched and they’ve been a huge success.
“They took off like wildfire,” adds Itzoe. “There was tremendous interest and tremendous use.” There’s a wiki for DW, and others for engineers and developers.
Despite the proliferation of these tools – including 47 employee blogs which started launching in August – there are no heavy handed policies that govern their use. Employees are treated like adults; and they behave in kind. The tools have disclaimers but employees are expected to adhere to Verizon’s Code of Conduct. A Code signed by each employee every year. In other words, if they abuse the tools they’re likely violating the code and therefore no additional monitoring or policies are necessary.
Another leading-edge productivity tool is the DW Toolbar. DW Toolbar is like a Google toolbar that rests at the top of the browser and is tailored to the individual employee. Powered by the Google toolbar appliance, the toolbar is personalized to the employees particular preferences including options for favorite links and news. The toolbar includes a search engine that searches the entire intranet – more than just the intranet portal and home page. Being a regulated company, the employee’s search results are also limited to those company areas the employee has legal regulatory access to (based on employee directory profile).
Change Management
Promoting it and encouraging use however required significant marketing and education. “It required a huge communication campaign,” says Itzoe. “The tools represented a huge change management endeavor. We knew we had to find creative ways to get people’s attention.”
One such tool is “Inside the Digital Workplace” – an online user guide with tips, FAQs, etc. Inside also includes stories on ‘life in the digital workplace’. Verizon also formed a cadre of DW volunteers: The Digital Workplace Warriors. The Warriors are volunteer testers or guinea pigs. When Verizon plans a new collaboration tool or application, the warriors get to play first – testing the tools and providing feedback for changes and improvements.
The formation of the Digital Workplace and the key representative tools took 2.5 – 3 years plus about 8 months of planning. The eWeb intranet portal has been in place for 4-5 years. Regardless, persistent communications was required to get employees to use the new tools. Prior to promoting the new voice portal, the portal received about 200 calls per week. This jumped to 10,000 in a day when a voice mail was sent to all employees promoting the new voice portal. The promotional voice v-mail highlighted a contest that awarded 1 in 25 callers with a prize. Traffic exploded. Voice Portal now enjoys a couple of million calls per year.
