CASE STUDY QIAGEN
QIAverse – a universe of possibilities: Introduction of a Digital Workplace at QIAGEN
About Qiagen
„Making improvements in life possible” is the motto of QIAGEN, a global company focused on the building blocks of life: DNA, RNA and proteins. Concretely, this means that QIAGEN offers differentiated sample-to-insight solutions for molecular analysis tests. The goal: to help customers gain valuable insights from any biological sample – from basic research to clinical care. The company currently has 35 offices in over 25 countries. Approximately 6,200 employees provide expertise and service to customers in virtually every corner of the globe.
Initial situation & goals
At the end of 2020, a far-reaching culture change process began with the EMPOWER initiative. Employees were to be empowered to make decisions and to take on more responsibilities. There were many challenges to overcome along the way to achieving this goal: decentralized information structures and a lack of transparency in a complex organization. At the same time, there were many coexisting communication channels. The intranet was outdated and could not be accessed via mobile devices. Within the organization, communication was mainly via e-mail, which made central archiving of information impossible. The compatibility and requirements for communication and collaboration in an increasingly hybrid work culture increased. In contrast, there was only a small internal communications team that managed the communication of all locations globally from headquarters.
The aim of the project was to create a holistic Digital Workplace geared to the needs of employees and providing them a central platform. All information was to be easily accessible and therefore improve transparency in the organization. The digital workplace was to link communication and collaboration, to create stronger networks across teams and locations.
The project
For the new Digital Workplace, a cross-functional core team was formed with employees from Corporate Communications, IT and HR to ensure maximum openness and integrity. The name of the platform, “QIAverse,” comes from a company-wide naming competition that employees could submit suggestions for, and vote for.
At the heart of the project was the need for an evergreen approach. The project was to result in a long-term program with clear responsibilities and distribution of tasks to anchor it sustainably in the company as a driver of the EMPOWER culture and to keep the platform permanently up-to-date and relevant. It was conceived as a joint project. Interested employees were involved and the project was supported by top management. The project team created personas to optimally address target group needs. This was particularly important because the new Digital Workplace was to be made accessible to all employees worldwide.
A central idea of the project was that the business units should be responsible for creating and maintaining their own content. To this end, representatives from all areas were appointed to determine the content structure, content owners and content creators. Before the go-live of the new Digital Workplace, they were given an introduction and training. In addition, a dedicated editorial environment was created for training. In line with the EMPOWER initiative, the aim was to break through familiar communication patterns and increase local communication activities. In this way, a “pull strategy” was to be established instead of push: Employees were strengthened in their independent thinking and actions.
Another important aspect was to develop additional measures for employees without direct access to digital company terminals. The Digital Workplace was optimized for mobile use and access via private devices will be made possible in the future. Interactive terminal solutions with access via touchscreens were developed, and “digital signage” solutions were deployed at central locations to push important content and news.
The solution
The new Digital Workplace with Microsoft 365 is based on SharePoint Online and Microsoft Teams as the interface. It consists of three central elements: A News Hub, a personalized workspace “My Area” and a classic intranet “Knowledge Base”.
The digital workplace is directly integrated into Microsoft Teams and can be accessed as a separate application. The header area offers users direct access to their most important content. In addition to the dashboard, this section also includes important apps and news. On the personal dashboard, all important information for users is available at a glance. They get an overview of tasks, documents, appointments, and saved links.
In another menu item, users can directly access their most important apps and thus save time. Alongside an overview of the tools in use on a daily basis, their most important tools, they can also find these sorted by department. They may edit this area themselves and add their most important apps. In this way, they can reach frequently used applications with one click from the Digital Workplace.
No digital workplace should be without relevant news. This way, employees receive the information that is most important to them directly and do not miss any relevant news within the organization.
An overview of the most important departments, such as Corporate Communications, is integrated into the new Digital Workplace. Besides information about the department, employees can also find important contacts, news, and upcoming events. The Viva Engage Community, which belongs to the department, is also integrated on the page. In keeping with the EMPOWER culture, the business units are encouraged to independently share content with the entire organization.
In a global company with numerous locations, it is easy to lose track. Thus, every site has their very own area in the Digital Workplace, where local employees can find everything, they need. Building plans or lunch menus as well as current news and events relevant to the site can be found here.
Evaluation & Change Management
For the newly created digital workplace to be a success, employees need to understand the solution and be keen to use it. That’s why the rollout created a user panel of 50 volunteers from all countries and levels to provide continuous feedback and act as ambassadors to the organization. This is combined with a comprehensive tutorial package for all employees, including an image film, video tutorials and a dedicated empowerment platform. Parallel to the launch, all employees had the opportunity to provide their feedback to the project team via a Microsoft Forms survey. A feedback option has also been integrated on many pages and is being used actively.
The core goal of the project was achieved in less than nine months. QIAverse has changed the way everyone works bringing great value and benefit to the organization. A lot of positive feedback from employees around the world reached the team via the survey.
Outlook
Further measures are underway: The further development of an ambassador network is intended to contribute to the long-term anchoring of QIAverse in the organization reflecting the EMPOWER culture. In addition, a detailed qualitative evaluation of the project is to take place in the fall of 2023 by means of a global employee survey to obtain further insights into the success and benefits for the employees.