This article will appear in three parts exclusively in the "Reader's Web" section of Intranet Journal. By way of orientation, I would like to introduce the major players in our Intranet project and give you some background on the history of Web development at Kettering Medical Center (KMC).

Stage Setting

The original KMC web page was started in 1995 by Janet Michaelis, a Special Project Coordinator in the Medical Education department using a local ISP. Janet helped prod the rest of KMC into the Internet Age and has remained an integral part of the web development effort.

Bill Perry, RN, was another Internet instigator who started out in Clinical Information Systems, which has since merged with Information Systems. He is a Clinical Information Specialist and experienced web developer who helped focus our development effort towards our target audience(s). Jane Buch is the Head Librarian at our Medical Library and the Chair of KMC's Internet Council, a multi-department group directing the Internet and Intranet developments. Jane has been at the forefront of KMC's Internet strategy.

Finally, your author is Brett Kottmann, Web Jester and (relative) late-comer to KMC, having joined the organization last year. I work in Information Systems with the mundane title of Network Administrator. Thanks in part to the team concept, I integrated easily into the Web Team and Internet Council.

Our corporate environment is a large regional hospital (there are a number of affiliated hospitals and facilities, but they will not be integrated into our Intranet for another 2-3 years). Our computing environment is a multi-segment network of mostly Intel based machines running various versions of Windows with enough Macintosh, Unix workstation, and proprietary systems to make things interesting. Our network infrastructure is equally diverse, consisting of Token Ring, Ethernet, ATM and ISDN. Our servers include Netscape's Enterprise Server version 2.01 and five Suitespot servers on order.

Connected users number approximately 1000, with about 300 currently on the Internet and the rest slated for connection by the end of the year. Prior to the need for Internet or Intranet access was known, it was decided to upgrade our machines to a new standard. For Information Systems, this has resulted in managing the connection process while rolling out a new standard machine (Pentium processor running Windows 95) at the same time. Fortunately the team concept has allowed the burden of developing the Intranet to be distributed across several different departments, saving IS from trying to co-manage three major projects at once.

Part 1: Using teams to develop an Intranet

One of the discussions in the Intranet eXchange centers around how to bring several different departments together to form an effective team for Intranet development. The Internet Council formed at KMC a good example of how to achieve this. Membership was solicited from all departments and those expressing an interest would send a representative who was either interested in the net or net knowledgeable. The Chair, Jane Buch, is a librarian and experienced with the Internet, especially when used as a tool for information and research.

The combination of interested departments and knowledgeable leadership allows the Council to address issues of content, direction, and funding without getting bogged down in common roadblocks to Intranet development such as lack of inter-departmental communication, cross-department funding issues, control and support issues, etc. Another major problem that has been avoided is deciding which department "controls" the Intranet. For our site there could be a number of departments that make reasonable choices including Information Systems, Medical Education, Medical Library, and Administration. Having a council that spans all interested departments makes it a truly corporate-wide enterprise. For detailed focus on a particular problem, the IC forms ad hoc task forces and assigns IC members to lead them. The original task force is the Web Team.

Building the formative KMC web site was the goal of the Web Team, which consists of anyone at KMC active in building web pages. There are currently over 30 people involved in some aspect of web design and construction, several of them members of the IC. The Web Team has been instrumental in ensuring that participatory learning be used when it comes to web page construction. Page Authors are helped along by Web Coaches--members of the Web Team who assist in learning HTML and related topics and teach the new members the basics of KMC web page philosophy. Web Coaches also help direct the future web site design and construction in coordination with the Internet Council. In addition, each page must have a Page Correspondent who is the email contact. This helps ensure questions submitted are responded to by people both knowledgeable in the appropriate subject and web savvy.

The reasoning behind this approach is to bring the departments into the process of building the site. The use of Web Coaches to mentor new Page Authors helps increase knowledge and interest by making the task of building a web page easier. Running the web site like a print shop where departments simply "drop off" pieces to be published would only prolong ignorance about the web and hinder participation. The people building the pages usually become the page correspondent, making it possible for each page to have an interactive link with the departments behind the pages. These users also become a pathway for web knowledge into the departments themselves, easing support and training costs.

Goals of the Web Team:

• Build KMC web pages and applications.
• Establish a consistent style for KMC web pages and applications.
• Establish points of contact in departments (Page Authors and Page Correspondents)
• Report to the Internet Council on the status of KMC web pages and applications.
• Use participatory learning to educate users about the web and the underlying technology.

Because so much of the early effort in building the corporate site has gone into education and training, some areas have lagged behind until recently. Enforcing a consistent look and feel, for example, has taken a back seat to simply getting content onto the site. We could have developed a template page onto which users simply graft their text and images, but that leads to cold and impersonal web pages. Our desire was to provide information in a friendly and interactive context where users would feel free to interact with the content providers and not be intimidated by the technology of medicine and health care. Because work was done to bring many departments into the fold during the Internet phase it has been relatively painless to ramp-up the effort for building an Intranet as well. Laying a solid foundation has been the key to success for the Internet Council and Web Team approach.

While the Internet was been a tool for providing information and communication to our audience in the community, the Intranet will be a tool for providing information and communication within the corporation itself. The focus shifts from providing information that is clearly defined to providing information and tools that make it easier for the users to do their jobs. The input of many departments is critical. The Intranet can not be a "one size fits all" approach, or the users will be overwhelmed by the amount of information they are presented with. Users should be able to pick and choose which resources they will use.

For example, instead of simply having one, or even a few, discussion groups, we are setting up numerous departmental level discussion conferences. (We are using Allaire Forums.) Each conference contains several forums with specific subjects. These forums usually span several departments, and allow users from each department to communicate with each other on those subjects. So instead of users going to each department discussion center and starting yet another thread on database reporting, a single forum about database reporting exists which is accessed as a common resource. Below is a diagram of how departments could share forums.

Fig 1

The discussion forum is another topic in the Intranet eXchange. One of the points brought up is how to get participation from various departments and people, some of whom are either not used to working in a team environment or who may not want to take the time to learn about the net. Just as the Web Coaches shepherd web page construction through participatory learning, experienced users (I'll refer to them as moderators for lack of a better term) can foster participation on discussion forums and other Intranet collaboration applications. By interacting with new users, either privately or directly on the forums, moderators can establish a pathway for these users to enter the exchange of ideas without feeling intimidated. They can also offer help in learning how to use the various features of the Intranet. (Indeed, the current support center structure can be used as an online help forum, and support center personnel make excellent choices for forum moderators.) Our own discussion forum structure is still in it's infancy, but we expect to be one of the most widely used Intranet applications.

Now that we're moving into production mode with our Intranet we continue to utilize the team metaphor. The IC is discussing establishing an Intranet application task force to coordinate the development of applications throughout KMC. Information Systems is establishing partnerships with several departments to develop applications that will serve more than one specific department or need. The Web Team has also started working with Community Affairs to coordinate a consistent corporate image across web pages and traditional print and broadcast media. In addition, the success of the IC and Web Team have resulted in more people accepting a team-based approach to future issues on the Intranet. The net result is a corporate resource in which everyone has a vested interest.

This is Part I.

Part II
Part III