Thoughtworks's intranet experience with LumApps

About Thoughtworks

Ongoing digital disruption is challenging enterprises to keep pace with the accelerating rate of technological change: this is where Thoughtworks helps its clients. They’ve been at the forefront of technology innovation as a thought leader over the past 28 years. The Chicago-based firm has more than 40 offices spread across 17 countries making for an impressive international client portfolio. In addition to innovation and technology, Thoughtworks seeks to amplify positive social change and advocate for an equitable tech future, believing that technology should benefit all of society. The organisation has a unique, open culture that’s based on diversity, a relatively flat hierarchy and autonomous teams to maintain its global success.

Employees:

10,000+

Services:

Internal Communications

Industries:

Digital Consulting

Locations :

The Challenge

Thoughtworks had multiple variations of intranets and communication platforms in the past. After scaling beyond the capabilities of Jive, the team migrated content to Google Sites. The solution was convenient given their adoption of Google Workspace, but severely limiting from an organization and content management standpoint. The lack of permission controls, templates and navigation features led to a disorganized and disconnected environment. Thoughtworks required a more sophisticated communication and employee experience solution to support their more than 10,000 employees.

The timeline of migrations and workarounds led to what Thoughtworks referred to as a, “teenager’s bedroom.” Content was scattered, the most valuable material was hard to find and no one wanted to tidy things up (except the KM&Comms team!).

Additional challenges included:

Multiple platforms, applications and links
No single source of truth
Geographical and team silos
Lack of content management features: permissions, templates, etc.

Thoughtworks amassed an impressive collection of content from subject matter experts around the world but it wasn’t always easy to find answers to questions or know the right person to contact.

As we focus on building out our digital workplace, we think it’s important to support new ways for people to work together and share information. We see a future where our tools help bring the information that you need to you, and we are excited to be building towards this, together with LumApps.

Andy Yates

Head Of Strategy Tech Ops at Thoughtworks

Introducing: Thoughtworks Central

Several events and key stakeholders spurred the knowledge and employee experience transformation. Initially, Thoughtworks rolled out a limited knowledge base team solution via LumApps. Eventually, Rafael “Rafa” Oliveira, Head of Knowledge Tech Delivery at Thoughtworks, attended the LumApps customer event, LUX, in New York City. Conversations with fellow LumApps customers highlighted the potential of LumApps technology. Rafa partnered with two colleagues on a similar mission. Martin Deakin, the Global Head of Internal Communications and Anindita Sen, the Global Head of Knowledge Management. All three worked together to merge the needs of communication, knowledge sharing and knowledge management.

This collective effort led to their platform being updated, expanded, and given a fresh name, Thoughtworks Central. Several goals were met during the following months:

A single source of truth, accessible to everyone regardless of location
Better personalization, simplification and synchronization of users and groups
A true “digital home” with appropriate branding and context
Efficient communication during the global brand refresh with a dedicated homepage section
Implementing a massive boost to content awareness, going beyond a news portal

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The second event happened in September 2021 when Thoughtworks successfully became a publicly-listed company on the Nasdaq stock exchange, with a first-day market valuation of almost $9billion. This unprecedented time in company history required an unprecedented level of communication and knowledge organization. Thoughtworks leveraged LumApps to create a section within Central dedicated to IPO news, FAQs and employee resources.

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When we look at traffic, we had two big spikes this year. One was the brand refresh, the second one was the IPO. With each of them, we needed to share a lot of information, there was a lot of communication involved. Central played an important role. Thoughtworks Central has continued to flourish as a connection point for the international workforce.

Rafa Oliveira

Head of Knowledge Tech Delivery at Thoughtworks

Key Use Cases

Knowledge Base

A library of resources allows the international workforce to find answers and get work done.

Employee Social Advocacy

An integrated social advocacy feature allows employees to easily share company news and messaging through their social media account, boosting reach and engagement.

Midweek Messenger

Every Wednesday, communication teams use LumApps’ newsletter functionality to send important updates and employee engagement initiatives – driving traffic to Central.

Easier Communication

During important moments in company history, communication teams leveraged LumApps to support employees and answer questions around their brand refresh strategy and IPO campaign.

Solution and Key Figures

Consistent benefits include:

Google integration: As a Google shop, Thoughtworks benefits from LumApps’ thorough integration with Google Workspace and Google Cloud Search.
Increased productivity: Employees have direct access to their digital home for all knowledge and collaboration needs.

High employee engagement: Central connects thousands of employees who work across 14 countries in more than 40 offices, or remotely.
Improved collaboration: Employees contribute, discover and engage with content in a simple and effective way through their LumApps platform.

Thoughtworks posted record numbers during their IPO week, the spike in traffic coincided with an integrated internal communication and social amplification campaign.

Key results

+294%

Through the employee social advocacy feature, there was a massive increase in active users who shared content on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook.

+51%

The platform supported a massive traffic increase during IPO listing day: Central had 5,140 unique visitors even though a significant proportion of employees were asleep during trading hours.

+75%

The IPO special edition Midweek Messenger (a weekly email digest of top stories on Central) recorded the highest-ever amount of visitors: three-quarters of all employees visited Central during IPO week.