A full-blown intranet in just a few weeks – for 300+ employees across 8 countries.
How Belgian family-owned Vasco Group strengthened engagement and connected its European sites with an off-the-shelf Involv intranet, built on SharePoint.
Radiators, heating systems and ventilation are the core business of Vasco Group. This Belgian family-owned company operates sites across several European countries. To strengthen internal communication and boost employee engagement, Vasco Group sought an efficient solution – and IT director Hans Steenbreker describes choosing Involv Intranet as “a logical step”.
The challenge: engaging employees and connecting them better
For Vasco Group, the primary challenge was to strengthen employee engagement.
“If you want employees to feel more connected to your company, you have to recognise that they need to get to know each other better. A good intranet can make a big difference there.”
Hans Steenbreker – IT director, Vasco Group
The solution: build on SharePoint, without starting from scratch
Vasco Group already had strong familiarity with Microsoft 365, so SharePoint was the natural foundation for the intranet. When Hans discovered Involv, he saw that Vasco resembles many organisations – Involv offered an off-the-shelf intranet using components that are relevant in nine out of ten companies. The critical distinction was that competitors lacked ready-made solutions and would have to build everything from scratch.
Hans deliberately involved end users in the design process, bringing employees together for brainstorming sessions. He made no distinction between job titles or departments – every user's input carried equal weight. Employees also participated actively during rollout: content was created by the departments themselves, with key users leading the effort. Thanks to that approach, training was limited to just three hours.
Vasco started with four departments. Over time, three more joined, bringing seven departments live with nine still to go. Marketing keeps the intranet lively by adding jokes in the slider for birthdays, and employees have shortcuts to the most-used business applications, making the intranet both a navigation hub and an application gateway. The intranet currently runs in the Dutch-speaking entities; the goal is to make it available across all ten European entities, which will require an English version and some additional work.
The result: live quickly, broad rollout and growing use
What Hans values most about Involv is the speed of implementation. A team of eight worked on the project, and within a few weeks they deployed a strong intranet. Building from scratch would have required substantially longer lead times.
Today, more than 300 employees across 8 countries use the intranet. Once the English version launches and all entities connect, Vasco expects growth from around one hundred to 320 users.
Key achievements
- Fast: a full-blown intranet in just a few weeks
- A smooth application with high user adoption
- Only 3 hours of training were needed
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