GOALS AND OBJECTIVES / SOLUTION OVERVIEW /

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1 Network Pioneers Intranet Story Series J. Liu Brookshire, S. Clark Ohara, C. Roberts and M. Spearman, Blue Beyond Consulting Juniper Networks Sunnyvale, California NEED/OPPORTUNITY / Juniper Networks was created with a vision to Connect Everything, Empower Everyone. Since the company s founding in 1996 by Pradeep Sindhu, it has grown from a small start-up to a thought leader and a US$3 billion rapidly growing global enterprise. A new CEO, Kevin Johnson, joined Juniper in September 2008 with a commitment to make the company the next US$10 billion technology leader. During the global economic downturn of 2009, the company chose to pursue a strategy that to some seemed counterintuitive: investing significantly in research and development (R&D) and innovation. The objective was to emerge from the economic recession as an even stronger player in the marketplace. Juniper s vision for the next decade The New Network foresaw a future of networking that is open, scalable, simple, secure and automated. Along with this vision, Juniper would also announce a new strategic approach, new cutting-edge products and solutions, enhanced partnerships, and a new corporate brand identity in late October The multi-day external launch event would coincide with Juniper s move to the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), culminating on 29 October 2009 with the ringing of the bell at the NYSE and an all-day global press conference. For Juniper s vision of the next decade and The New Network to be successful, the company needed the full support and commitment of its workforce the people charged with turning this vision into reality. Therefore, it was imperative to engage and involve employees on the ground floor of this ambitious global initiative and in the launch of these important strategic announcements. Juniper employees are extremely proud of the company s history and innovative roots. It was essential to acknowledge and recognize the achievements of the past as Juniper made plans to celebrate the company s future. Honoring the journey that got Juniper where it is today would help to build excitement and buy-in for the future. To do this, the communication team created a multifaceted teaser campaign leading up to the launch, Imagine What We ll Do Next. A feature story series kicked off the campaign. Called Network Pioneers, it showcased key historic events and a number of employees who built Juniper and prepared it for the next decade of growth and innovation. INTENDED AUDIENCE(S) The primary audience consisted of all 7,000 Juniper employees plus more than 1,000 contractors spread across three regions (the Americas; the Asia-Pacific region; and Europe, Middle East and Africa) in 47 countries. The largest percentage of the company s employee base is engineers, followed by sales and marketing teams, and other business functions such as finance, HR, legal, corporate strategy. All employees have e- mail access, and most have a company-provided laptop. Stories in the Network Pioneers series highlighted a mix of historic engineering, marketing and business events as well as employee profiles designed to appeal to diverse 1

2 audience members in a format that was easily accessible to them via and on Juniper s intranet. In developing the stories and employee profiles, the team considered research from the company s most recent employee survey regarding tenure of employment: Approximately 20 percent of employees had worked at Juniper for more than six years, about 70 percent had been at Juniper between one and five years and the remaining 10 percent had been with Juniper less than one year. The Network Pioneer stories were intended to showcase Juniper s legacy of innovation, to recognize and honor the talents and contributions of long-time employees, to educate and inspire newer audience members, and to rouse the enthusiasm of all employees as vital participants in the next chapter of the company s history. GOALS AND OBJECTIVES / The overarching goal of the Network Pioneers story series was to pay tribute to the past by linking Juniper s heritage as an innovative start-up to its future as a high-tech leader and rapidly growing global enterprise. The series was designed to showcase and honor the company s history, recognizing the hard work and dedication of the people who have contributed to Juniper s success along the way, while also inviting employees to imagine what we ll do next and inspiring them to join the next chapter of Juniper s history. As the kick-off to the Imagine What We ll Do Next teaser campaign leading up to Juniper s launch of the next decade and vision of The New Network, the Network Pioneer story series had to capture the attention and interest of an extremely busy workforce across multiple job functions and geographies. The main objectives of the Network Pioneers story series were to: Make the stories come alive and resonate with employees to attract high levels of readership. Ignite a viral conversation; generate feedback from employees that demonstrates interest and engagement. SOLUTION OVERVIEW / Because senior leadership decided to keep the launch of the next decade its new vision, strategy, products and brand identity under wraps until the big day, employees learned the news at the same time it was announced externally. To generate anticipation of the launch without giving away any specific details, the team designed a teaser campaign, called Imagine What We ll Do Next, to signal that significant developments, relevant to every employee, were just around the corner. Kicking off the Imagine What We ll Do Next teaser campaign was the Network Pioneers story series that traced the company s history from an innovative start-up in 1996 to a global networking leader 13 years later. Combining engaging narrative and behind-the-scenes facts with personal profiles of company pioneers, the five-part series unfolded on the corporate intranet during the week leading up to the launch. Essential to making Network Pioneers successful was to take the reader to defining moments in Juniper history through tight and vivid writing. A standard corporate history it was not; the communication team wanted readers to feel the tension felt by the engineers who had built the 2

3 very first pieces of hardware to get a sense of what it was like not to know if complex systems they had worked on for years would ever flicker with signs of life. Where possible, the team leveraged existing archival documents in order to create the series on a small budget and in a tight time frame. They also reached out to stakeholders across the company to secure interviews about company history and employee profiles. The internal communications team worked closely with HR and with Juniper s founder and Chief Technology Officer Pradeep Sindhu to identify key people who contributed to the company s rich history of innovation. Having employees tell their own stories, as well as the story of the company they helped to shape and grow, generated enthusiasm and pride among readers. The Network Pioneers stories showed that through tireless innovation, Juniper s people had built a great company recognized for its cutting-edge products and technical leadership. The team s hope was to incite employee pride around the past in order to provoke excitement, passion for and commitment to continuing that legacy by imagining, innovating and creating what s next. Key messages of the series were: As Juniper prepares to launch into the next decade, it is important to honor the company s heritage, history and the dedication of employees who built the company. Juniper is proud of the innovation and invention that propelled the company to where it is today, and it sees the accomplishments of the past as creating the unique foundation upon which tomorrow s innovation can occur. Juniper greatly values the dedication and contributions of its employees past, present and future. The five-part story series included the following chapters, detailing the corporate history from the company s beginnings to the present day and featuring one to two Network Pioneer profiles of employees who played pivotal roles during key turning points in the evolution of the company: Part 1: Beginnings Part 2: Going public, becoming global Part 3: Rapid growth in challenging times Part 4: Industry in transition Part 5: Reimagining the networked world In addition to posting the stories prominently on the home page of the intranet, the team also e- mailed a teaser version of each of the five stories to all employees that included a direct link to the Network Pioneers intranet page. This was the first time this type of double-barreled approach was employed (the team generally keeps all-employee s to a minimum so that employees pay more attention to messages that come from internal communications). Sending these stories directly via signaled something new and different was in the works, increasing employees interest and engagement, and fostering anticipation for what was coming next. The senior director of internal communications led and oversaw the entire employee engagement campaign, including the Imagine What We ll Do Next teaser campaign. The senior manager of internal communications was tasked with driving the Network Pioneers story series, which was 3

4 the kickoff for the teaser campaign. The team also partnered closely with Blue Beyond Consulting on the development of the idea and to assist with project management, research and writing. The senior manager, together with the extended team of internal communication professionals and writers, researched, wrote, approved, produced, posted and distributed the fivepart series in less than three weeks. Primary roles included project planning and research, content and key message development, writing, design, and communication/distribution to employees. IMPLEMENTATION AND CHALLENGES / BUDGET The budget for the Network Pioneers story series was US$10,000, which included extended team and writers fees (in addition to the support from Blue Beyond Consulting, Juniper employed the services of two additional contract writers, who often work as part of the extended internal communications team) and freelance photography fees (for the employee profiles). The extended team has worked for Juniper for a number of years, which allowed the company to harness their institutional memory in researching and writing the stories. To further save time and money, archival documents and existing company literature were leveraged and repurposed as appropriate for use in the stories. TIME FRAME The initial editorial meeting with the internal communications and writing team was held on 9 October 2009, and the first Network Pioneers story was ed to employees and posted to the company intranet on 21 October The other four stories appeared respectively on 23, 26, 27 and 28 October 2009, leading, as planned, right into the major launch of the company s new vision on 29 October CHALLENGES The main challenge the team faced was to produce a five-part feature series in a two-week time frame with limited staff and resources. After reaching out to human resources, the company founder, and other leaders across the company to identify the right employees to profile as network pioneers, the team had to research the five stories; schedule and conduct multiple interviews; edit and rewrite as required; obtain approvals; and schedule, coordinate, and manage photo shoots for the eight employee profiles. They also had to provide graphic design, post the stories to the corporate intranet, handle global distribution and manage continuing feedback. Thanks to an extremely organized, aligned and coordinated team with excellent team communication they were able to successfully execute the plan. MEASUREMENT/EVALUATION OF OUTCOMES / The main objectives of the Network Pioneers series were to: Make the stories come alive and resonate with employees to attract higher levels of readership. This objective was achieved: During the week prior to the Next Decade Launch, the intranet page featuring the Network Pioneers story series had more than 9,000 hits. On average, stories featured on the intranet home page get around 700 hits. This shows that the readership for Network Pioneers was well above average. Ignite a viral conversation; generate feedback from employees that demonstrates interest and engagement. This objective was also achieved. In the week leading up to and in the weeks following the launch, the team received numerous employee comments, 4

5 either specifically in response to the Network Pioneers series or more generally highlighting pride of Juniper s history and commitment to the company s future. Some sample comments included the following: o Thanks for the great series on Network Pioneers. It s very cool to see the rich history that has brought us to where we are today. o Nice content!!!! o The recent announcements and marketing activities are very exciting. These activities make my commitment to the success of Juniper, my team and myself even more profound. I ve been in for over seven years, including my time at a purchased company (Neoteris), the acquiring company (Netscreen) and of course Juniper. I m a startup person but the products, the people and the company have kept me here for this long because I m still passionate about all three. So count me in! I m confident we can continue to analyze, commit and above all execute. o I came to Juniper a year and a half ago after a long stint with Cisco Systems. I was very intrigued with the laser-focused product set and the story of JUNOS. I have found that the outstanding people at Juniper and JUNOS have exceeded my expectations. It was very exciting to watch the announcements of last week unfold, a truly exciting time indeed. o Juniper continues to be the company I thought it was in There have been no disappointments. In fact, the company has exceeded my expectations. I cherish the commitment to quality from product to organization to people, all across the company. Juniper had a great story before, and the story only gets better with the new announcements. The industry needs a company like Juniper to step forward and change the game. We continue setting the bar on technology and vision that separates us from the rest of the companies out there. I am proud to be at Juniper and, of course, I am on board! o I ve been with Juniper for over four years, coming over in the Redline acquisition, and this is the most excitement I ve seen since I came on board. From our best-of-breed technologies to our very strategic partnerships to our fantastic leadership team, we are poised to take it to the next level. 5