From 0 to 60: Playbook for a successful global enterprise intranet implementation

Sammons Enterprises, Inc. (SEI) is a diverse holding company comprised of financial services, industrial equipment and services, real estate investments, and infrastructure businesses operating in five countries. Headquartered in Dallas, Texas, Sammons Enterprises is one of the largest privately-held companies in the United States,

SEI’s service company, Sammons Corporation, is located in Dallas, Texas.

Sammons Enterprises is a large organization with over 6,000 employees divided into 10 segments. Each segment has its own distinct company identity and branding. There are technology challenges, including various platforms used by different segments, disjointed HR systems, and limited analytics capabilities. The organization also sought to shift toward an “ownership culture” to improve communication and transparency.

Communicating to employees within a large enterprise composed of distinct businesses can be challenging, but the outdated intranet made it almost impossible.

And with 10 distinct segments under the Sammons Enterprises umbrella, they needed to maintain one brand identity, while making it easy for employees in different segments to access enterprise content.

But the intranet was hard to access and navigate, which discouraged employees from using it — severing a vital link to the enterprise. Other challenges included employees in different segments using various tech platforms, disjointed HR systems, and limited analytics capabilities.

These challenges hindered progress toward Sammons’ goal of an ownership culture — one in which every employee is empowered with the information they need to be an owner in their role. The organization was unable to provide employees with easy access to the information they needed to succeed. This limited access to vital enterprise-level information created silos, with many employees not even truly understanding they were part of a larger organization.

Sammons needed to break these silos and unite all employees within the enterprise — providing them with easy access to one source of truth for important enterprise-wide information to support stronger decision-making.