There cannot be many intranet managers who have not benefited from the wealth of insight and encouragement that James Robertson offers through the reports and papers published by his company, and through his Column Two blog. The volume of content that he and his colleagues have created is vast (over two hundred articles on the web site alone) to the extent that intranet teams almost need a Step Two Librarian to manage it. Now James, together with his colleagues, has written What Every  Intranet Team Should Know. It will, I am sure, become a benchmark book on intranet management.

The book has seven chapters, which cover the six phases of  intranet evolution, the four roles for an intranet, how to find out what staff need, how to design the intranet, how to deliver great content, the role of the intranet team and how to plan intranet improvements.  James has capitalised on previously published content but in doing so has condensed the material into 100 pages of a small-format (A5 size) book without sacrificing anything in the way of clarity of writing style and a strong sense of his own personality. Although the title assumes there is an intranet team don't be put off by this if you are working on your own, perhaps in a part time role. You will benefit from this book as much as an established team will.

To the best of my knowledge this is only the second book on intranet management written in this century. (The other book is Why Intranets Fail and How to Fix Them) Many of us have been trying to get James to write a book on intranets for some time, with the expectation that when he did the book would be something rather special. It is.

James writes in the introduction that as his company have learned about intranets they have seen a number of fundamental concepts and approaches emerge that can guide intranet teams to greater success. They have captured the most important of these ideas in the book to act as a guide for intranet teams and the organisations they serve. It is this distillation of the good practice that makes this book so valuable.

Every intranet manager (and quite a few consultants!) will benefit from this book. It is an exceptional contribution to the development of excellent intranets, and also an invaluable book to give to those senior managers who still (amazingly) do not understand the benefits of investing in an intranet team.

The book can be downloaded from Lulu for the price of $89 plus postage. Every intranet team should have a copy. 

Martin White