Free-flowing communication
A recently launched intranet has broken down departmental barriers at Three Valleys Water, a U.K. water supplier, providing corporatewide visibility to activities and information. To date, 1,250 employees, spread among five main offices and many smaller locations, have access to the intranet. The firm employs 1,400.
The intranet uses the portal capabilities of Oracle9i Application Server, in conjunction with SiteScape Forum collaboration software for such functionality as discussion forums, calendaring and workflow.
Says Mark Seymour, e-business manager for Three Valleys Water, "We want to ensure that it is not just seen as another IT application but will change, for the better, the way employees work and communicate as individuals and in teams. [The solution] provides us with an effective set of collaboration and workflow tools that will be used to bring employees closer together and create efficiencies within our organization."
Gary Thomas, development manager of Three Valleys Water, adds, "The Oracle/SiteScape combination . . . allows content and knowledge to be shared and maintained. Pertinent content is starting to be targeted and delivered to employees, and this will provide exciting challenges as we all try to adapt to new ways of working."
At Three Valleys Water's request, SiteScape created a variety of individual portlets to insert a single, specific collaboration component within the Oracle portal, including discussion/docshare forum, calendar, site map and search box. Those enhancements have since become part of SiteScape's standard Oracle 9i Application Server Portal Development Kit.
Because Three Valleys Water is so process driven, over the next few months, various features of Forum, such as customizable workflow with routing and notifications, will be used to get tasks completed faster and more efficiently, according to a recent press release from SiteScape.