INTRANET  IN INTERNAL COMMUNICATION

Introduction

It is a tool for communication used to facilitate communication between people or work groups to improve the data sharing capability and overall knowledge base of on the organization’s employees. An organization intranet includes internet access but it is firewalled so that its computers cannot be reach directly from outsides. Firewall is a computer system that automatically prevents an authorized person from getting information without authority when it is connected to a network such as “internet” but allows them to receive information that is sent to them. It is only employees have access. It consists of internal email system example mtulevell@saut.ac.tz.

Besides company email and internet access; An intranet generally incorporates internet websites. These websites are consisting documents, company news and other information. It is also known as corporate portal, student portal etc. However the intranet has its usefulness in an organization as follows;

Communication; intranet is useful for communication and collaboration between the employees for successful functioning of any organization. It is also used as corporate culture exchange platforms.  Example Large numbers of employees discussing key issues in intranet forum and application could lead to new ideas in management, productivity, quality and other corporate issues. Intranet acts as communication hubs for staff. Corporate communication such as memos, staff news and announcements can be stored centrally and accessed at any time.

Sharing resources and best practice; A virtual work space and community can be created to facilitate information storing sharing and collaborative working. An intranet can also act as a training content to staffs.

Knowledge management; Knowledge management means capturing, organizing and retrieving corporate information. With all tools and information within the intranet and employees constantly adding new information in the form of comments, discussions, blogs, documents; the intranet serves as a centralized place to capture important corporate information. Tools like search ensures that employees across the company network can find just information they need to perform their jobs.

Time saving; Intranet technologies allows public relations practitioners to distribute valuable information among the employees in a fast and efficient way. It saves time by interactivity for instance Employees can access information at a relevant time that suits them. It is more useful than sending and waiting for email and email repliers.  

Productivity; Internet provides fast information to employees that help them to perform their various tasks with responsibility. An employee can access any data from any data base of the organization without wastage of time. However, employees who work in project can collaborate easily ensuring better and faster results.

Cost effective; the use of paperless refers to intranet that supports online publishing, it cuts down the printing and distributing costs as well. All the documents of the company can be published through the intranet by using the web pages as compared to spending money and printing documents.

Furthermore Modern intranets contain not only static information, but the actual tools that employees use for work. This presents a great opportunity to use intranet as a place where companies can documents processes. Many companies use intranet to automate anything from simple processes like employee appraisal to sophisticated processes like CRM and project management.

                                        DAHAYE THERESIA BAPRM 42544