What IT means to us: Innovation
Experts from three leading corporate communications companies talk to Skillset about what IT means for their business - here, focusing on innovation.
- Richard Cobourne, Director, On Screen Productions Ltd
- Stephen Watson, Managing Director, and Chris Templeton, Producer, CTN Ltd
- Paul Tarplee, Chief Technical Officer, Twofour Group Ltd
Database library
Richard Cobourne: "We have developed our own bespoke database library with SQL (structured query language) When you're dealing with several thousand tapes, you need to be able to get them out quickly."
Virtual private network (VPN)
Richard Cobourne: "Most of the work we do is outside the UK, so good communications and the ability to work remotely are not luxuries. They're a necessity. So is speed. I started by writing down what we wanted. I wanted to be able to walk out of here with my laptop and all the information from my workstation. But I also wanted to leave everything here, so people could see what I'd been doing. I needed to know that, if someone stole my laptop, or if it was wiped out, I'd still have a backup. VPN was a logical extension of the way we worked.
"When we stay in hotels with in-room broadband connections, we create a tunnel into our network here. It's like being in the office, except a little slower. And it only costs around $17 a day in the USA or about 12 Euros in the EU. It's fast and always on. It's great for exchanging large files, and you can fire things both ways."
Employees' register of interests
Paul Tarplee: "On our intranet, we have a database of employees, and a ‘register of interests'. Each employee has the option to keep up-to-date details of personal activities and hobbies - the books they read, the films they like, favourite directors - that kind of thing. So if you have a project where you need a team with knowledge of sci-fi films, you simply do a search and find maybe five staff you can get together for a discussion.
"We were developing our intranet anyway, and the core of it was always going to be a user directory. But we hadn't thought of adding staff interests and skills. So we picked up on those aspects and added them to the directory. It's a really useful step in finding the right people for projects - and for making us all aware of the talent we've got."
Innovations for our clients
Stephen Watson and Chris Templeton: "Aviva, the UK's largest insurer came to us. They have 60,000 employees worldwide. We'd done various bits and pieces of satellite business television for Norwich Union, who are part of Aviva. They said, ‘getting all of our staff in front of TV sets is complicated and time consuming. The one thing all of them have is a mobile phone - even if they're not office-based. Could you create a communication that would use that platform?'
Now:
- we produce a short, audio programme about the latest corporate news and views
- we send SMS text messages to every employee's mobile where an alert appears
- employees then dial a Freephone number and listen
- we stream a version of each audio update on Aviva's intranet"
