VEGA case study
Immediacy CMS puts vital information on tap for VEGA’s
international workforce
VEGA is a specialist professional services company
providing independent consulting, technology and managed solutions.
With 30 years' experience of specialist market and technological
domains, VEGA offers independent expert advice and practical
support services in the effective implementation of business
strategy for clients in the aerospace, defence and government
sectors, as well as commercial business. VEGA has a rich service
portfolio grouped into three areas – Consulting, Technology and
Managed Solutions – extending horizontally across its market
sectors.
It is a large, geographically spread organisation with offices and
operations throughout Europe, over 800 on- and off-site personnel
and more than 200 clients worldwide. The company’s principal
locations are in the UK, Germany, Holland and France, although many
of its people are embedded in programmes at client
sites.
Challenge
The corporate intranet is a vital tool for
VEGA, being a significant part of the company’s internal
communications strategy as the hub of corporate communications. It
is a repository of company information, providing employees with a
single, central source for the access and exchange of news, forms
and documentation, with the potential to expand into a more
collaborative working environment and develop business delivery
practices.
VEGA launched its first intranet in 2004, whereby staff would add
their content as and when required, using free .Net software. It
grew to over 700 pages, and attracted regular visitors, but not the
majority of the company.
“It also lacked an audit capability, making it difficult to
track who was responsible for what and to enable the content to be
updated in a controlled, structured way,” says communications
manager Damian Schogger. “There was no consistent style, look and
feel, and as it grew, it became increasingly difficult to manage.
The intranet should be the backbone of our corporate communications
– the one place our staff could rely upon for accurate,
comprehensive information. We needed to look for a content
management software application that would deliver this.”
Solution
VEGA carried out an evaluation of the content
management system (CMS) market with regard to a number of key
criteria. “We wanted to improve access and awareness of the
intranet as a corporate resource, making it people’s first port of
call when searching for information, ideas, knowledge and opinion,
and delivering greater value and support in their day to day jobs,”
Damian Schogger explains.
“Above all, the software had to be usable by anyone with basic
computer literacy, so that all our staff could share the
responsibility for keeping our content up to date. We also wanted
out-of-the-box functionality, the flexibility to apply our own
corporate branding to the look and feel of the site, and the
opportunity to create bespoke plug-ins.
“Immediacy’s CMS ticked all the boxes. Their team was also very
good and gave us the confidence that they could support us in
meeting our objectives.
Immediacy was able to provide VEGA with a blended solution that was
tried and tested, solid, delivered bespoke customisation around our
specific configuration requirements, and supported us on an ongoing
basis.”
The Immediacy CMS is a mature software product that has been
widely adopted across the private and public sector, with an active
and thriving user community. The system makes it quick and easy for
people to create, publish and manage dynamic content across
websites, intranets and extranets. Noted for its outstanding ease
of use, rapid deployment, and straightforward integration with
other systems, it provides an industrial-strength, scalable CMS
that works for any size and type of organisation.
Result
VEGA implemented the Immediacy Content Management System and Web
Asset Manager in February 2008 and has developed a bespoke plug-in
for its people directory. The company may now extend its use to its
public website.
“It’s intuitive and easily adapted with our own plug-ins – which
we’ve done. We run the whole project with about 30 web editors, and
a small management and development team,” says Damian Schogger. “It
took no more than a couple of hours for the editors to get up to
speed: templates and the Microsoft look and feel make it very easy
for them to add and change content, and move sections and pages
around in a disciplined way. The developers like its .Net
functionality, and its similar appearance and handling to the
Microsoft Windows environment makes it very easy for people to use.
All the comments we’ve had from users have been very positive.”
Another critical reason VEGA chose Immediacy is that at the time
it was the only one that fully addressed AAA compliance
requirements. “With the majority of our clients in the aerospace,
defence and government sectors, having that built in was critical
to us,” explains Damian Schogger.
Immediacy provides all the audit trails and reporting
information VEGA’s webmaster needs to evaluate the site’s success
and ensure global consistency, style and accuracy of its content.
“We wanted a simple and effective way to audit the site and control
content sign off, and Immediacy’s workflow tools enable us to apply
permissions at a granular level so that we can provide controlled
access to our large workforce according to their authority and
responsibilities,” says Damian Schogger.
During 2007, VEGA explored the potential for search engine
optimisation (SEO) and has now applied it to the Immediacy intranet
to speed up and improve the relevance of search results.
Damian Schogger concludes, “Immediacy is a good, solid product –
with ease of use and intuitiveness that is exciting to prospective
buyers.”
