Proximus: Keeping its promise of the best communication experience for its customers and employees

The Proximus Group is active as a provider of digital services and communication solutions in the Belgian and international markets. The group opens up a world of digital opportunities, so people live better and work smarter. They do this by: building the best open gigabit network, offering products and services tailored to the needs of every customer, by being the trusted digital evolution partner for companies and the Belgian society, and by contributing to a greener world.

Employees:

+ 10 000

Services:

Internal Communications, IT

Industries:

Telecommunications

Placing Employees at the Heart of the Business

Proximus offers customers a world of digital opportunities so that they can live better and work smarter.

This business ambition is reflected in their mindset toward internal stakeholders. Talent and career development are highly valued at Proximus in the pursuit of business objectives. They aim to create a culture in which employees develop, make a difference, contribute to business results and be the best brand ambassadors.

Achieving this goal means working towards providing the best possible conditions for employees to do their jobs. At the end of 2020, Proximus introduced their new fully multilingual collaborative intranet platform #WAP+ (standing for “We are Proximus”), to communicate, facilitate connections among employees, promote informal cross-team collaboration and improve knowledge sharing.

The Challenge

Stimulating interaction

Proximus had extensive objectives requiring a solution that goes beyond traditional internal communication tools. Interaction and collaboration are at the core of their corporate culture along with a commitment to positive employee-employer relationships. Therefore, they wanted to provide a digital workspace where every employee can create, share and interact across the business.

Speaking the local language

As a leader in the Belgian market, the use of multiple languages is key to Proximus’ communication strategy. Proximus communicates in 3 languages – Dutch, French and English. Previously, multi-language communication was a time-consuming process and employees’ feeds were overlapped with duplicating content.

All functions matter

At Proximus, a considerable percentage of the workforce are non-office workers, like technicians and customer-facing teams that work from various locations without daily access to a desktop computer. Proximus needed a mobile, on-the-go solution to ensure those employees are just as involved in the organization as office workers.

Building a Multilingual and Collaborative Platform

Starting their transformation project in the midst of a global pandemic increased the importance of finding a suitable solution. The stable and secure transition was a key to ensuring the continuity of business operation.

To support their needs and address its challenges, Proximus trusted LumApps to be their new employee experience platform. To set the project for success and ensure local support, the internal teams decided to rely on one of LumApps’s trusted partners, Devoteam G Cloud Benelux for the implementation and deployment of the platform.

A major deciding factor for Proximus was the multitude of communication flows between collaborators and the goal of breaking through language barriers. The ease of creating content in multiple languages and the flexibility to target it to the right people is a key features. Employees interact in various social and professional communities. The automatic translation of posts and comments allow for effective collaboration because employees can interact in their own language and reach everyone across the organization.

The major advantages of WAP+

Structured homepage ensuring clarity and relevance
Greater personalization of the content
Fully multilingual solution (both on content and comments)
Enhanced search capabilities based on metadata
Flexibility and ease of publishing any type of content via templates

Why our customers choose us

Looking for an intranet that starts from the user and is designed in full co-creation mode? Go for LumApps. The effort put in understanding the needs and complex structures of an organization is just admirable!

Annemie Peetermans

Business Transformation Manager at Proximus

The current (COVID-19) context is not easy for anyone, but I’m convinced that the development of digital tools, such as WAP+, is essential for Proximus’s future. As the main communication tool, it allows us to stay connected and to exchange opinions and ideas.

Guillaume Boutin

CEO at Proximus

Key Use Cases

Using communities to empower employees

Proximus has a strong sharing culture between entities and currently counts 436 active WAP+/LumApps communities. As Microsoft Teams is used to collaborate on shared deliverables, WAP+ communities are focused on sharing knowledge, giving support and creating a sense of belonging. Every employee can take the initiative to start a community, as long as there is a need, a clear objective and interest to manage it.

Employee Voices

Every employee in the organization can share their experience, stories or lessons learned through blog posts. Support materials and guidelines are provided to give equal opportunity and empower employees from different backgrounds to participate. At first glance, it’s a simple blog, but it’s a powerful tool for setting company-wide trends, empowering people, and facilitating knowledge flow across teams.

Agile Transformation Program

Supporting major business transformations is done through a distinct subsite that helps employees understand changes and their impact. The site and its dedicated community consolidate all the project communications. According to employee profiles, there are built-in personal action plans to help them follow processes step by step, deadline reminders, progress updates and support documents.

Employee Social Advocacy

The integrated social advocacy tool enables Proximus to create powerful brand ambassadors throughout the lines of their workforce. People are not only able to share corporate news through “WeBuzz”, but they can also propose topics and content to be shared externally through a dedicated “LifeatProximus” community.

#WAP+ is our main platform of internal communications. With #WAP+ and the mobile app every colleague can participate in what’s going on at work and take up an ambassador role via the social advocacy. It’s fully multilingual and it provides our publishers all flexibility to create impact and engagement with their communications. Their experience with migration of content, the built-in social advocacy module and a clear roadmap were extra assets that made us choose LumApps.

Bert Leoen

Corporate Communications Director at Proximus

Key Results

99%

Active users

38%

Contributing users

258

Publishers

436

Active communities

244

Active ambassadors

426

Posts created for the past year

50%

Adoption by 2023

8,24/10

Employee recommendation note

Mobile App

Employees can connect to their workspaces no matter where they are thanks to the LumApps for Intune mobile application. It’s particularly useful for technicians and field representatives that receive company and team updates through a personalized news feed, but also for leaders and everyone that works in a hybrid way and seeks maximum flexibility. Everyone has instant access to Proximus News, a complete employee directory and can contact colleagues on the go or find support in one of their professional communities.

The Need

At Proximus, technicians, customer-facing teams and other non-desktop workers represent a considerable amount of the workforce. Employees in the field have strict schedules and no daily access to desktop computers, but still, need to ensure they are delivering the best possible customer service. To avoid the perception that looking for resources and information is time-consuming, the company wanted a solution that would make communications accessible and practical for all employees.

The Solution

With the LumApps for Intune mobile application, Proximus has built a mobile experience for all its employees that provides continuous access to knowledge at their fingertips. The on-the-go solution enables employees to exchange knowledge, collaborate, and connect no matter their location or work device. As hybrid work environments become more common, the mobile app offers maximum flexibility without compromising work efficiency.