In a recent article, I talked about how the Microsoft Suite isn’t designed to stand alone as an IC tool and that internal comms professionals deserve better internal communications tools that are easier to use.
This is one of the reasons that the team and I at Sparrow Connected have designed our internal communications platform to empower internal comms teams to fully carry out all the comms functions – creating content, analytics, reporting, stakeholder mapping, or managing corporate directories, without continuous IT involvement or IT know-how.
We’re hearing from the market that IT – the department usually tasked with technical innovation – is a roadblock to the same thing they are supposed to enable. It’s time for a change. It’s time to free IC from IT.
Here are some of the reasons why:
- IT often becomes an organizational bottleneck.
- IT is usually understaffed and overworked.
- IT doesn’t have the time to sit down with the internal communications team and help them on a regular basis.
- IT often resists the introduction of new tools even before they understand whether the new tool will add to or subtract from their burdens.
- IT resources have become more and more expensive over the last two years.
- IT demand and turnover are both high so maintaining a qualified IT workforce is difficult and costly for most organizations.
- IT and comms sometimes have an antagonistic relationship.
Both internal comms and IT benefit when a company’s internal comms platform doesn’t require continual IT intervention. It’s one less thing that a maxed-out IT team has to deal with and it gives internal comms teams a lot more freedom. They’re better positioned to:
- Be more strategic
- Analyze and report on their impact
- Deliver timely communications
- Segment their audiences
- Respond more quickly when crisis hits
Free Yourself From IT with Sparrow Connected
Sparrow Connected is the only internal communications platform that truly frees IC from IT. Here’s how:
SETUP
Setup requires no more than 30 mins from IT
Getting the Sparrow Connected platform set up requires no more than 30 minutes of involvement from their IT team, regardless of the number of employees on the platform.
CONFIGURE
Map Stakeholders without IT
Performing a stakeholder mapping on Sparrow Connected is done using either static or dynamic rules that automatically determine stakeholder to audience membership. No need to rely on IT to set up and maintain groups in Active Directory.
ACCESS
Invite and Manage Users Independently
Since Sparrow Connected supports Single Sign-On (SSO), user management is handled exclusively by the internal communications team. IT doesn’t have to invite users or reset passwords.
CREATE
Create and Format Content - No HTML Required
Being able to create content in Microsoft Word and simply copy and paste it into Sparrow Connected while preserving all the formatting means internal communications professionals don’t need to know HTML and they don’t need to rely on IT for help with content creation.
REPORT
View Reports Right on the Platform
Reports and dashboards are built right into Sparrow Connected so IT doesn’t need to pull and aggregate usage data from different platforms. The reporting process is fully automated.
Here’s a good before and after Sparrow Connected example:
Before Sparrow Connected
Internal communications wants to create a dynamic audience to send a message to. They ask IT to create the audience. IT is busy and ignores them. IT eventually gets it done two days later after multiple prompts. The message goes out late.
A task that should only take minutes to do becomes a multi-day affair.
A week later, internal communications needs to make a change to that audience. The process repeats itself.
After Sparrow Connected
Internal communications logs in to Sparrow Connected and creates the audience using built-in rules. The message goes out minutes later.
The entire task takes minutes, not days.
A week later, internal communications changes that audience with one click. Easy.
So, what do you think?
Successful internal comms doesn’t require ongoing IT involvement - fact or myth?
Fact.
With Sparrow Connected, internal communications teams can configure their own groups, manage users, create content, and analyze performance, all 100% independently from IT.
Experience the freedom of gaining independence from IT. See how Sparrow Connected can help. Book a demo today
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