Collaboration in a Large Asian Insurer
Updated May 29, 2014
Collaboration in a Large Asian Insurer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Software Version
Version 6.0.2.2
Modules Used
- Ideation
Overall Satisfaction with Jive-x (Discontinued)
We use Jive Engage across the whole company in many different markets in Asia/Pac. It is used for project management, knowledge repository, employee engagement and corporate communications. Our platform which we call WAVE allows us to reach out across geographical boundaries to help make our large organisation feel small. It helps to bring in the family from New Zealand to connect them more personally with the relatives in Taiwan. Jive allows us to get around e-mail size limitations to collaborate on large files between regions and Group Office. Some of the actuarial valuation spreadsheets and data files can be huge! Jive has also allowed to better integrate new acquisitions within a country with focused employee engagement activities.
- I write these from the perspective of the Community Manager - You can choose your level of moderation on Jive to match the policies of your organisation. From full on content pre-moderation to to completely reactive moderation, you can take your pick. We chose the latter end of the spectrum, trust your colleagues to be professional and you will be rewarded with professional content.
- The ability for users to set up their own groups very easily with out the need to revert to developers is great as this allows individuality. This allows for organic growth with out impact on the budgets of departments and teams to get their work done on Jive. The option is always there to get 'someone in to fancy it up a bit' however you will find that your own people will develop those skills themselves. Your users will also learn from each other and you should actively encourage stealing of best practice from across your organisation.
- The knowledge repository or Question and Answer features are the most value-adding for me. Having searchable history that allows your to get answers quickly so the next question can be asked is the reason why you should have a collaboration platform in the first place, Jive makes that easy.
- Single Sign On has been a excellent addition for us, if Jive does not make your colleagues lives easier then they won't use it.
- You can customize and brand Jive to reflect your company identity.
- It is difficult to create and add your own customized apps and widgets we have found. From a user perspective things like creating a survey app has proven problematic to integrate into Jive. There are OOB solutions available but they are quite expensive especially when you apply a per user/per month fee to a company of our size. Everyone is watching the bottom line.
- Ironically the ability to customize every group layout has thrown up its own issues with engagement. No two groups look the same and as such it is sometimes difficult for the late adopters to get a sense of where to find things on each page. We have gone down the road of creating templates so that some uniformity is introduced to the look and feel.
- It is sometimes troublesome to get a resolution to issues as the Jive platform is constantly moving forward with new features and the developer pool is small. This is exacerbated by the time zone differences between Asia and America.
- As of writing there is no Data Centre in Asia which was announced at the JiveWorld conference in 2013. I have a large number of users in China so have the data nearer to them would be a great boost to access speed which can be slow especially in China.
- The analytics on my version are poor, there is no number for unique views of pages and groups so it can be difficult to gauge actual usage.
- For non-power users, frequent training and reminders are required to ensure momentum especially as this software is new to them. Embedding a culture of collaboration is a long road.
- More ease in sharing vital information and learning across the wide geographical footprint our company has.
- Gradually changing the culture of what has traditionally been a large conservative insurer to collaborative sharing of knowledge and insight.
- Making the company feel small again and the implications of that in becoming a more agile and innovative company.
I was not involved in the evaluation and selection phase.
Using Jive-x (Discontinued)
Jive-x (Discontinued) Support
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Quick Resolution Good followup Knowledgeable team Problems get solved Kept well informed Immediate help available Support understands my problem Quick Initial Response | None |
Yes
Jive is treated with the same importance as email in our company so immediate 24 hour support is a pre-requisite. Support is generally very good and our TAM is extremely focused on our needs. The time-zone difference can be a pain in resolving minor issues as there can be major lag in communications.
Yes - Over the last two years we have reported many bugs, initially they were fixed in a timely fashion but as we have stayed on a hosted version, new bugs that are raised are 'known bugs', 'fixed in the next version' and will not be fixed or patched in our version. This is understandable but can be quite frustrating.
While developing our own apps Jive gave us over and above the standard to try and help us to deliver. I am grateful to them for this help.
Using Jive-x (Discontinued)
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Like to use Relatively simple Easy to use Well integrated Consistent Feel confident using Familiar | Requires technical support Slow to learn |
- Asking questions and finding out if someone has asked before.
- Community Manager reports are easy to use.
- Finding documents
- Creating more complex workflow for project work and decisions made
- Creating multiple BAU reports for metric recording
- The main Activity stream is unappealing and puts users off.
Yes - The mobile interface is very easy to use and has the right amount of information that you would want for quick updating on the road. The iPad version is more versatile than the smartphone version allowing you to do more. You can customise this look and feel also which helps makes for a smooth UX.