These past few years have accelerated changes and disrupted how companies lead, enable, empower, and engage around communications. Leaders in corporate communications, human resources, and IT are all tackling new responsibilities and challenges in connecting with employees who no longer regularly share the same workspace and may be overwhelmed with increased communication volume, velocity, and variety.   We have been catapulted into a new employee experience paradigm, and it can be challenging to get our bearings. We now need to plan for the future, but it can be hard to consider the future when the present is filled with unique and pressing communication challenges. Yet, the future of communication may hold answers to problems we are experiencing today; it may inspire us to change and, perhaps most importantly, enable us to understand how to prepare to embrace a better one.    We have gathered leading industry experts on employee communications, intranets, the digital workplace, and employee experience to help us navigate the years ahead. Join James Robertson, a Step Two global thought leader and author on digital employee experience, Suzie Robinson, author of the popular ClearBox employee experience platforms report, and Richard Harbridge, a celebrated Microsoft MVP, as they share insight on how to better understand, leverage, and prepare for the future of employee communications.

1. The Future of Employee
Communication
Richard Harbridge
2toLead Chief Technology
Officer & Microsoft MVP
and how to prepare today
Session 1: Roundtable Discussion
Thu., May 5, 2022 1:00 PM (EST)
James Robertson
Step Two Founder &
Managing Director
Suzie Robinson
ClearBox Digital
Workplace Consultant

2. What is employee experience, why does it matter,
and what is it not?
Question 1
What holds the future back for employee
experience and customers today?
Question 2
What are important new communication approaches
or improvements, and what is driving them?
Question 3
Lightning round where we answer your questions!
Your Questions

3. Hi, I’m Suzie Robinson!
I am an Intranerd ( Intranets) and work
on making sense of the digital employee
experience ecosystem.
We worked hard to author an annual
buyer’s guide to Intranet and Employee
Experience platforms.
I work at ClearBox Consulting
where we help make the workplace a
better and more productive experience.

4. Hi, I’m James Robertson!
I’m the founder of Step Two
(www.steptwo.com.au), a specialist digital
workplace consultancy headquartered
here in Australia.
We help organisations establish and
sustain modern intranets and digital
workplaces, and to deliver a great
digital employee experience (DEX).
I’ve been in this space for 25 years.

5. My Twitter is @rharbridge, I’m super friendly & proud to work at 2tolead.
Richard Harbridge
2toLead Chief
Technology Officer &
Microsoft MVP
Speaker & Author
Super Friendly

6. What is employee
experience, why does it
matter, and what is it not?
Question 1

7. Digital employee experience (#DEX)
is the sum of the digital interactions
within the work environment.
Definition v2
www.steptwo.com.au/papers/what-is-digital-employee-experience

8. How it all fits together…
Intranet
www.steptwo.com.au
Digital Employee
Experience (DEX)

9. 01
02
03
04
06
05
Leadership
Culture
Capability
Technology
Environment
Lived
experiences
DEX Enterprise
Framework
www.steptwo.com.au
Version 1.1 (7/21)
Engagement,
digital dexterity &
work practices
Skills,
methodologies &
resources
Real-world experiences
of employees
Workplaces,
devices &
hybrid working
Platforms, solutions &
product management
Vision, strategy &
leader actions

10. © ClearBox Consulting 2022

11. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
Jacob Morgan in “The Employee Experience Advantage” suggests three environments that support and reinforce each other.
With the shift driven by Hybrid Work, it has pushed greater weight on cultural and technological environments.
The feeling employees
get working for your
organization
The actual spaces in
which employees
work
The tools
employees use to
get their jobs done

12. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
The way we see digital employee experience at 2toLead is based on 3 primary areas of investment.

13. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
We are experiencing greater volume, velocity, and variety of communication and collaboration. This
requires us to collaborate, communicate and manage employees in better ways than we have before.
Of employees and
executives cite a lack of
collaboration or ineffective
communication for
workplace failures.
Of employers have
identified that enhancing
the employee experience
is an important priority.
86%
Source: Willis Towers Watson
Source: Salesforce
92%

14. Employee experience is comprised
of cultural, technological and
physical environments.
Answer 1

15. What holds the future back
for employee experience and
customers today?
Question 2

16. Integrations
Showing how it's done - Akumina
Analytics
Showing how it's done - Staffbase

17. Accessibility
Showing how it's done - Invotra
Admin & Legacy Feature Experience
Showing how it's done - Powell

18. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
How the roadmap is broken down into categories
Facilitate Governance & Responsibly Empower
Absorb complexity into management, align with policies, simplify compliance, security and performance.
Establish An Effective Foundation
Foundational and important work from strategy to architecture that is necessary for continued digital workplace success.
Migrate & Modernize
Move away from legacy systems into long-term, supported, and more integrated experiences.
Foster Collaboration, Connection & Engagement
Make it easy and efficient for employees to onboard, teams to work together, from anywhere, to gain insights on
what is important and feel included.
Improve Communication, Navigation & Search
Provide more effective ways to communicate, reduce noise, feel informed, engaged and get their core tasks done
with increased efficiency.

19. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
PHASE 1 - Modernize
0-6 months
PHASE 2 – Connect & Integrate
6-12 months
PHASE 3 – Intelligent & Automated
12-24 months
A summary of the initiatives planned over the next 24 months
Digital Workplace
Strategy & Roadmap
Modern Navigation
(Custom Header & Footer)
Employee Preboarding
Portal(s)
Migrate & Develop
Intranet Content
Establish Digital
Workplace Backlog
Intranet Site, Page &
Team Template Design
Intranet Governance
Design & Planning
Employee Networking &
Connection App (Release 1)
Foster Collaboration,
Connection & Engagement
Improve Communication,
Navigation & Search
Migrate
& Modernize
Establish An
Effective Foundation
Facilitate Governance
& Responsibly Empower
Teams Company
Communicator App
Employee Onboarding
Organization Portal(s)
Employee Onboarding
Departmental Site(s)
Digital Workplace
Directory (Release 1)
Digital Workplace
Directory (Release 2)
Employee Networking &
Connection App (Release 2)
Teams Company
Communicator App (Enhancements)
Targeted Search Experience
& Search Refiners
Intranet Navigation
& Search Design
Intranet Integration
& Solution Design
Intranet Content Design
& Migration Planning
Build Of Sites, Pages,
Teams & IA
Automating & Improving Onboarding,
Transfers & Offboarding Solution(s) (Release 1)
Bring The Intranet Into
Context Of Work (Topics)
Bring Knowledge To Users In The Context
Of Their Work (Topics Broader Rollout)
Enhanced Intranet
Insights (Release 1)
My Links, Alerts &
Subscriptions (Release 1)
Digital Center Of
Excellence (Release 1)
Digital Center Of
Excellence (Release 2)
Targeted Viva
Learning (Pilot)
Intranet Launch

20. say DEX is extremely or
very important
45%
EXTREMELY OR VERY IMPORTANT SOMEWHAT NOT SO OR NOT UNSURE
2021:
42%
2020:
Source: Step Two DEX survey 2021

21. At what levels within organisations
is DEX being led?
0 25 50 75 100
Centrally/ top down
Within individual
business units
By staff/bottom up
35%
21%
30%
STRONGLY
SOMEWHAT
NOT AT ALL
UNSURE
27%
Source:
Step Two DEX survey 2021

22. How ready are organisations
across three aspects?
VERY OR MOSTLY READY
0 25 50 75 100
People
Process
Technology
SOMEWHAT READY
NOT READY
UNSURE
54%
31-35%
11%
Source:
Step Two DEX survey 2021

23. Gaps in the digital employee
experience are not yet met by vendors
and customers. The wrong focus and
organizational requirements are not
being addressed.
Answer 2

24. What are important new
communication approaches
or improvements, and what
is driving them?
Question 3

25. Edit & Publish
Engage & Connect
Amplify & Enhance
Employee Experience
Communications

26. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
Contextualized navigation and discovery based on where and how users work benefiting from
cloud scale AI, digital behavior capture & continual content analysis.
In emails, instant messages,
team messages, pages, news,
documents and more… the
knowledge, people, digital
spaces, and more are
available in context.

27. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
Contextualized insights based on the topic discovery that includes people, resources, sites,
communities and more can improve our curated assets and support our extended team of content
leads and departmental stakeholders.
Content leaders can
leverage the insights
provided by Viva Topics by
rationalizing them with
curated resources to
improve them.
Does that product site
internally have
links/connections to the
people, resources and sites
suggested by topics?

28. Page 28
ESTIMATED COMPLEXITY
Company
Communicator for
Microsoft Teams
Employee Communications
Take company communications to
the next level with an enhanced
company communication
experience that enables pushing
key messages to people and
channels in Microsoft Teams.
Try It Yourself Today
Microsoft Solution Discover Another 40+ Solution Ideas In Our eBook

29. Model by Step Two (www.steptwo.com.au), for more detail:
www.steptwo.com.au/papers/whats-the-digital-maturity-of-your-internal-communications
1. Formal internal communications
Low
maturity
• Heavy use of email
• ‘Scattergun’ comms generating
comms overload
• Newsletter/newspaper style comms
• Low rollout of tools
• Low or no adoption
• Poor digital literacy
• Use of ‘shadow IT’ by early adopters
• Ad-hoc communication regarding
social and culture
• Social activities are all off-line
• Digital engagement is low
• Corporate intranet in place
• Intranet not a primary channel for
internal communications
• Information often shared via emails,
not intranet
• Limited flexible working, primarily
office-based
• Traditional team practices
• Limited adoption of digital tools to
support new work practices
Medium
maturity
• Regular, timely communication
• Modern style, engaging messages
• Clarity between ‘content’ and
‘comms’
• Primary collaboration platform in
place
• Varying adoption across the
organisation
• Wide range of digital literacy
• No formalised purpose
• Enterprise social tool in place
• Widespread but shallow interactions
• Channel for some leader
engagement
• Primary channel for formal
communications
• Trusted information source
• Governance and management
fundamentals in place
• Widespread flexible working
supported by digital tools
• Traditional work practices mirrored in
use of online tools
• Wide range of digital literacy
High
maturity
• Comms strategy in place
• Targeted and personalised comms
• Two-way communication
• Real-time metrics
• Clear purpose and business drivers
• Proactive activities to increase digital
literacy
• Governance and management
models in place
• Rich social interactions, including
across org structure
• Strong sense of shared culture online
• Online employee reocognition
• Key role as ‘enterprise front door’
into digital workplace
• Targeted and personalised
communications
• Comprehensive governance in place
• Consistently high digital literacy
• New work practices shaped by
modern digital tools
• Effective collaboration within and
between teams
Potential
benefits
• Improved effectiveness of internal
communication
• Increased staff satisfaction and
engagement
• Improved service delivery
• Increased effectiveness of teams and
business units
• Improved service delivery
• Greater knowledge sharing
• Increased staff engagement
• Strengthened organisational culture
• Greater staff retention
• Improved effectiveness of internal
communication
• Improved service delivery
• Enhanced management of
knowledge
• Increased effectiveness of individuals
and teams
• Improved coordination of activities
across the org
• Increased organisational flexibility
and resilience
2. Collaboration 3. Social & cultural 4. Intranet 5. Modern work practices

30. Attractive Final Result - Unily Simple & Effective Creation - Interact

31. Multi-Media Options - Omnia
Orchestration - Firstup

32. Newsletters- Staffbase
Mobile Experiences - Communifire and COYO

33. Communication volume, velocity,
and variety have all increased along
with a transformation driven by
hybrid work, AI, and cloud-scale.
From editing to engagement and
now to employee experience.
Answer 3

34. Rapid-fire lightning
round where we answer
your questions!
Your Questions

35. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
• FREE download: 715-page report
reviewing the best intranet and
employee experience platforms on the
market
(V1.1, released April 2022)
• Online guide: How to choose intranet
(and other) software
• Blog post: Intranets that help internal
communicators
• Employee mobile apps report

36. You will love the way we work. Together. ™
Free Resources:
• Best practice intranet methodology:
Intranet Roadmap
• DEX state of the nation: DEX survey
results
• DEX materials for senior leaders: DEX
on Medium
Plus: Winners of the Global Intranet &
Digital Workplace Awards Report

37. M365Intranets.com
M365Sprawl.com
M365Campaigns.com
Explore 800+ Pages of
Free Expert Guidance…
M365Metrics.com
M365Resources.com
SharePointMigrations.com

38. Thank you!