INTRODUCTION
The Internet (also called “the Web” or the “World Wide Web”) is a worldwide network that allows organisations to send and receive communication (Gray, 2006). Internet technology is becoming increasingly pervasive within organisations. The terms to describe the resulting access to information and suites of applications through the Web browser are having a multiplying effect: intranet, corporate portal, enterprise portal, and enterprise knowledge portal. Technology facilitates the identification, creation, and diffusion of knowledge among organisational elements within and across organisations. For knowledge management, people (and not technology) solve information and knowledge management problems. Wells, Sheina, and Harris-Jones (2000) indicate that less than 5% of employee knowledge is actually captured and accessible across the organisation.
Enterprise portals were triggered by the Internet as organisations sought to replace the Internet portal (e.g., Yahoo!) within an organisation to unify information access and improve management of vast information resources (Harris, Phifer, & Hayward, 1999). Enterprise portals are being presented as the tool to revolutionise access to information and knowledge (Cloete & Snyman, 2004). Currently there is a market hype in portal software technology. The aim of this article is to examine some of the literature of the evolvement of the intranet to the enterprise knowledge portal in organisations.
BACKGROUND
An intranet (or internal World Wide Web) is a network architecture designed to serve the internal information needs of an organisation using Web (Internet) concepts and tools (see, for example, Cortese, 1996). Turban, Rainer, and Potter (2005) indicate that an intranet is a private network that uses Internet software and TCP/IP protocols. Defined technically, intranets are the application of Internet technology (and specifically the World Wide Web service) for a prescribed community of end-users (Scheepers & Rose, 2001). An intranet is a network designed to serve the internal informational needs of an organisation using Internet concepts and tools (Turban, McLean, & Wetherbe, 2004).
Organisations can use Internet networking standards and Web technology to create intranets (Laudon & Laudon, 2000). They provide the same capabilities as Internet, namely inexpensive and easy browsing, communication and collaboration (Turban & Aronson, 1998), but intranets are used solely for intraorganisational communication activities and information flow (Abraham & Seal, 2001). Intranets can provide a platform for networked applications that can run on many different kinds of computers throughout an organisation (Laudon et al., 2000). Typical intranet applications include:
• publishing corporate documents;
• providing access to searchable directories (e.g., telephone and address lists);
• publishing corporate, departmental, and individual pages;
• providing access to groupware applications;
• distributing software;
• providing electronic mail (e-mail);
• transacting with other organisational computer-based information systems;
• organisation-wide information searches;
• providing a consistent user interface; and
• data warehousing and decision support access.
Turban et al. (1998) and Turban et al. (2004) note that intranets have the power to change decision-making processes, organisational structure and procedures, and help re-engineer organisations. The use of intranets has increased rapidly not only as an internal communication system, but also as a facilitator of e-commerce (Turban, McLean, & Wetherbe, 1999). Robinson (1996) suggests that intranets can be applied to enhanced knowledge sharing, group decision, and business processes. Information that is most frequently included in intranets inter alia includes data warehouse and decision support access (Chabrow, 1998). Many organisations have benefitted from use of the intranet Web-based technology and have made their organisations more efficient (Sprout, 1995).
THE EVOLUTION OF THE INTRANET
During 2002, KPMG Consulting (2002) reported that organisations were focusing strongly on internal communications projects (such as intranets). Answers.com (2005) indicates that some “corporate analysts have predicted that corporate intranet Web portal spending will be one of the top five areas for growth in the Internet technologies sector during the first decade of the 21st century.” This is not surprising since the amount of information that now has to be managed within an organisation is outstripping the capability of the traditional static Internet model. Grammer (2000) notes that the typically static and isolated methods of creating intranet content cannot keep pace with organisational ongoing and dynamic information needs.
The term portal was initially applied to “gateways” on the Internet. A portal is a gateway (Gray, 2006). Answers. com (2005) describe a portal as a “Web ‘supersite’ that provides a variety of services including Web searching, news, white and yellow pages directories, free e-mail, discussion groups, online shopping, and links to other sites.” The Web site indicates that the major general-purpose Web portals are Yahoo!, MSN, and AOL and are the Web equivalent of the original, pre-Web online services such as CompuServe and AOL. A portal may also be a vertical market site that offers the same services as a general-purpose site, but to a particular industry such as banking, insurance, or computers. However, as greater benefits of the portal approach using Internet technology within organisations became apparent, the “portal” term took on a new dimension–the corporate or enterprise portal. Winkler (2001) defines a corporate portal as one, which provides personalised access to selected information of a specific organisation. Corporate portals are really Web sites that contain links to specific portions of an organisation’s data (Gray, 2006). An enterprise portal is only an information technology tool in the implementation of knowledge management (Cloete et al., 2004).
Soon (2005) defines the essential elements that support the use of corporate portals as
• information dissemination or communication facilitated (any channel e.g., Web publishing, message board, chat-room, e-mail, etc);
• creation of business intelligence or competitive advantage;
• focus on central knowledge repository;
• support decision-making;
• business legacy applications and database (e.g., portlet, Web form);
• emphasis on business operations; and
• facilitate end user’s business work processes.
While distinguishing between corporate information portals and corporate knowledge portals, Soon (2005) considers the enterprise portal to be synonymous with the corporate portal. Answer.com (2005) also considers these two terms to be synonymous, citing that “a major industry shift in Web portal focus has been the corporate intranet portal, or “enterprise Web.’” This Web site suggests that some features of enterprise portals are:
• Single Touch Point: The portal becomes the delivery mechanism for all business information services.
• Collaboration: Portal members can communicate synchronously (through chat or messaging) or asynchronously through threaded discussion and e-mail digests (forums) and blog.
• Content and Document Management: Services that support the full life cycle of document creation and provides mechanisms for authoring, approval, version control, scheduled publishing, indexing, and searching.
• Personalisation: The ability for portal members to subscribe to specific types of content and services. End-users can customise the look and feel of their environment.
• Integration: The connection of functions and data from multiple systems into new components/portlets.
The term enterprise portal is increasingly applied to the collection of applications using Internet protocols to access core and peripheral systems within organisations. Daniel and Ward (2005) indicate that an enterprise portal definition moves beyond intranet in that it is not simply used to provide corporate information to employees. These researchers define enterprise portals as “secure Web locations, that can be customised or personalised, that allow staff and business partners access to, and interaction with, a range of internal and external applications and information sources. Uses of a portal may include improved access to information, increased collaboration, greater use of existing applications, and effective integration between applications.” The spread of enterprise portals promises to bring a sense of order to the corporate information repository. Phelps and Mok (1999) and Horton, Buck, Waterson, and Clegg (2001) report that enterprise portals also provide end-users with the
• opportunity of tailoring the information received; and
• ability to interact with existing business applications through the portal interface.
The enterprise portal is thus viewed a “one stop shop” for clients and customers of an organisation, providing second tier information from core systems to groups of end-users who need peripheral elements of information from those systems rather than direct access. This is facilitated by the flexibility of Internet technology, which allows information to be presented in a uniform manner using internet protocols rather than proprietary interfaces. Perhaps most importantly in view of information overload, a portal allows either the administrator or the end-user thereof, the ability to limit the information presented to a specific portal user depending on the role or identity of that end-user (personalisation or customisation). Harris et al. (1999) caution that enterprise portals should not be mistaken for the essence of knowledge management.
According to Detlor (2000), the differentiation between intranets and portals lies in the directory aspect of the latter since “a portal’s primary function is to provide a transparent directory to information already available elsewhere, not act as a separate source of information itself.” Skratulja (2003) concurs by stating that “while enterprise portals hold no content themselves, the content they present needs to be well-managed via a structure and taxonomy.” This researcher alludes to the confusion experienced by organisations in attempting to make the appropriate selections of enterprise portal technology due to the high proportion of publications emanating from vendors rather than academic researchers and the resulting blurring of terminology. This confusion is even to be found within the definitions applicable to the components of the enterprise portal and Skratulja (2003) gives an example of personalisation and customisation defined by a practitioner in the case study. Some future portal trends are now presented.
FUTURE PORTAL TRENDS
Skratulja (2003) suggests that the core competencies for an enterprise portal are a:
• single point of access;
• means for gathering, sharing, disseminating content;
• means of access to relevant content; and
• means to improve ease of access to content.
The functions for an enterprise portal are personalisation and customisation, the ability to manage end-users, content, and the ability for end-users to publish content and subscribe to content and secure access. However, once having located or built software, which allows for all these enterprise portal functions, the practitioner is faced with a difficult task in the project–implementing the enterprise portal in such a way that it moves beyond a corporate information portal to a corporate knowledge portal (or enterprise knowledge portal). According to Soon (2005), this requires the software be capable of supporting the process of knowledge creation and not simply storage of and access to information. This researcher indicates that “an information portal delivers, stores, and retrieves explicit knowledge as Web information dissemination (as a result of the mode of externalistion of knowledge). A knowledge portal however has to allow all the four knowledge conversion modes to take place.”
Chan & Rosemann (2002) define three types of knowledge within an organisation and its resources as
• Know-What: Declarative knowledge (i.e., metaknowledge).
• Know-How: Procedural knowledge.
• Know-Why: Usual knowledge–not simply to be stored, but to be clarified and updated e.g., using the portal to engage an expert.
Soon (2005) indicates that the differentiating factors between corporate information portals and enterprise knowledge portals include that the latter allows all of these information types to be stored and added to through a cycle of knowledge creation activities, which are also supported by the portal. Additionally, a knowledge portal plays an important role in keeping each bit of explicit knowledge updated. The difference between an enterprise information portal and an enterprise knowledge portal therefore lies beyond the technology, in the enterprise environment and in the commitment of the end-users to contribute to and use the resource. Hall (2001) suggests some useful techniques and factors, which an organisation needs to adopt to ensure that its portal becomes a repository of living knowledge shared by the community of end-users. It is only when these environmental elements are conducive, that benefits of the enterprise portal will be realised.
CONCLUSION
Enterprise portals are the focus of significant vendor competition and attention with functionality and expectations propounded which extend beyond static intranets, which preceded them. This market hype has simultaneously clouded definitions applicable to such portals and raised high expectations, which are not often realised in practice. There is an emerging body of research, which argues that to fulfill all the goals that an organisation has for portal adoption, there is a need to look beyond the technology by creating a conducive organisational environment and a community of end-users who facilitate making the enterprise knowledge portal a meaningful contributor to their organisational success.
KEY TERMS
Corporate Information Portal: Synonymous with corporate portal.
Corporate Portal: World Wide Web site that provides the gateway to corporate information from a single point of access.
Enterprise Knowledge Portal: Enterprise portal with additional support for capturing tacit knowledge, and provision of access to expertise as well as enabling user interaction to create knowledge with their collective insight, value, and experiences. It is a combination of technology and environmental enablers.
Enterprise Portal: Secure Web locations that can be customised or personalised that allow staff and business partners to, and interaction with, a range of internal and external applications and information sources.
Intranet: A private organisational network that uses Internet software and TCP/IP protocols.
Knowledge Portal: A smaller version of an enterprise portal, which may not include extranet aspects.
Portal: Access to and interaction with relevant information assets (information/content, applications, and business processes), knowledge assets, and human assets, by select target audiences, delivered in a highly personalised manner.
