Paul Chin
(postpaulchinonline.com)

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During lunch with a friend and former colleague, I was almost upended by laughter when she related to me a story about a business trip she had taken to Singapore several years ago. As is always the case with business trips, it's necessary to participate in a well-known ritual called the schmooze-a-thon.

During this particular session, all of the participants gathered around a restaurant table as a queue of waiters filed in, bringing all manner of exotic food to the eagerly waiting guests. There, my friend, the fearless soul that she is, stared down at a beady-eyed and tentacled creature resting on her plate—a creature that has been informally dubbed "Funky Octopus" for lack of a better name. Struggling with her chopsticks, she took a tiny bite... the rest of this story, I'll leave to your imagination.

The whole point of this narrative is to illustrate the fact that few of us are brave enough to try something completely new without first taking a tiny bite. Perhaps by past experience, we know that if we take that large leap of faith, one of two things will happen: you'll spit it across the table and commit a catastrophic social faux-pas or you'll gobble it down and ask for seconds.

Truth of the matter is that it makes sense to ensure the success of a greater whole by first tackling a smaller piece. Simple HTML-only document management systems of the early 1990's have given way to more robust, content laden intranets with dynamic database integration. With all the different uses for intranets now compared to a decade ago, it's vital to tackle a smaller working model before investing the time, effort, and money into achieving Nirvana in one try.

Let's take a closer look at the benefits of an intranet pilot:

• Pilots are working models
• A tool to get managerial buy-in
• Put theory into practice
• Test intranet team dynamics
• Obtain feedback from a smaller test group

Pilots are Working Models

Why should I waste my time and effort building a model when I could be building the real thing?

This is a misconception. Pilots will save time and effort by allowing you to experiment with the same functionality of a production intranet on a much smaller scale. It will also aid in the prevention of the negative snowballing effects of "Back to the Old Drawing Board Syndrome"—an affliction that has caused the premature death of many promising projects.

If you do decide to kick your project off with a pilot, it's important to develop a usable model. Some companies design "throwaway" intranet pilots that are based on generic and hypothetical templates. They build these pilots as a facade for presentation purposes, to test out new software, or to experiment with how the system will fit into existing corporate IT infrastructure. It makes a lot more sense, however, to build a real piece of the overall project.

Let's say your intranet will be made up of four core branches, each corresponding to your four business units. Rather than building a throwaway site, select one of these branches in which to build your pilot. This way, when you get the green light for the project, you'll already be a quarter of the way there.

Pay special attention, though, to the branch you choose to base your pilot. Don't pick the smallest one simply because you think it will be quicker or easier to build. Whichever branch you select, it must be large enough to provide you with an accurate indication of real usage. Otherwise, you'll get a false reading.

A Tool To Get Managerial Buy-In

The most critical component to long-term intranet success is support from the senior members of management. And in order to gain this support you need to prove to them that you're able to accomplish what you're proposing. This goes far beyond the PowerPoint presentation with static screen captures of what you promise to build if they sign over a blank cheque.

You can reference whitepapers, reviews, and case studies until everyone passes out in the boardroom (or in this case "bored-room"), but they won't be swayed by that alone. A static presentation is fine to get an initial idea across, the coup de grace is a working model that enables them to kick the tires of a fully functional intranet with real data. This test-drive will allow your potential sponsors to get a better sense of intranet functionality, look-and-feel, and navigation that paper and screen captures just can't simulate.

An intranet pilot, along with your business case, is your one best chance to convince the inquisitive managerial decision makers who control so much of what does and does not happen in your company. It's the all-important fork in the road that determines whether you'll be riding atop a well-groomed Arabian horse as a crowd of adoring fans toss rose petals in your direction or whether you'll be wrestling with a stubborn beast-of-burden as angry onlookers pelt you with rotten tomatoes. This is your chance to win them over, so make it count.