The Cost Of Not Having An Intranet At Your Startup
by Barsha Bhattacharya Startups 26 September 2023
Over the last few years, the global startup landscape has been evolving rapidly. With more and more small and medium-sized businesses entering the market, an often overlooked but critical factor that can significantly impact a startup’s growth is the absence of an intranet. Let’s shine some light on the cost of not having an intranet at your startup through this article. On top of that, we will also explain some of the losses you will face if you don’t have one.
A Brief About The Startup Landscape
Before we dive into the cost of not having an intranet, let’s set the stage by briefly exploring the startup landscape. Over 150 million startups are there in the world today, with 50 million new startups launching each year. These startups are responsible for creating jobs, backing the economy, and bringing in a host of innovative products and solutions.
The Intranet Advantage
An Intranet is an internal ecosystem that a company builds to make collaboration, communication, and data sharing easier for their employees. Consider it as a common repository containing all the essential resources and information. Each of your team members can use this repo to access the respective files to get relevant information and stay up to date about any important news. You can conduct your own research, find out details, and book a intranet free demo for a tool that fits your needs.
The Costs Of Not Having An Intranet
The following are some of the disadvantages of not having an intranet system in place:
Communication Breakdown
Without an intranet, startups often rely on disjointed communication tools like email, instant messaging apps, and phone calls. However, the communication that takes place through these channels is fragmented and often results in a breakdown. The calls can be missed, messages left unseen, and emails left unread.
Silos Among Departments
Startups that lack an intranet are prone to creating information silos, where knowledge and data are hoarded by specific individuals or departments. This hinders collaboration since your team members do not get access to the information required to perform quality work. Lacking the necessary information leads to uninformed decisions that don’t bring you the results you desire.
Diluted Productivity
Inefficient processes resulting from the absence of an intranet can hamper your productivity. Employees spend more time searching for information, dealing with communication issues, and manually performing tasks that could be automated through a well-structured intranet.
Employee Onboarding Challenges
Employee onboarding is at the core of every company. Without an intranet, this task can become overwhelming, as there is no centralized platform for sharing training materials, company policies, or welcoming new team members. This can result in a complex onboarding process that can disappoint a newly hired employee.
Data Security Risks
Intranet provides a secure environment for storing sensitive company information. Without one, startups may resort to using insecure file-sharing methods, potentially exposing confidential information to security breaches. And in a world where 2200 cyber attacks take place each day, securing data must top the priority list for startups.
Missed Collaboration Opportunities
In today’s highly globalised world, the rising popularity of remote and hybrid working models has especially made collaboration more crucial than ever before. For startups not using an intranet, it is challenging to enable a smooth collaboration among teams. This leads to missed opportunities, ideas, and perspectives of different talents that could help you enhance the productivity levels of your startup.
Scalability Challenges
As startups start thriving, their way of communication and information sharing evolves. Without an intranet that can scale with the business, startups may find themselves outgrowing the existing tools and facing complex transitions that can disrupt operations.
A Quick Summary
The cost of not having an intranet at your startup is the sinking of every possible KPI. Be it broken-down communication, silos between your teams, dipping productivity, hectic employee onboarding, data security risks, and whatnot, all such indicators start turning red if you do not have an intranet set up for your brand. Therefore, if you have your eye on scaling your startup and want it to outrank your competition, you must have an intranet solution in place to make the journey easier.
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