Ziik inspires R-kioski in Finland to reconsider their internal communications

About the company

The R-kioski chain traces its roots back to 1910, when the first railway book stores opened in stations along the railroads of Finland. Today, the chain counts around 440 stores, but the number is not static. R-kioski regularly opens and closes stores to reflect changes in customer needs and demographics.

R-kioski is owned by the Reitan AS, which also owns the Danish and Norwegian chains of 7-Eleven convenience stores. The companies do not have a centralized or shared IT department but are encouraged to share ideas and experiences. So, when R-kioski decided it was time to look for a new intranet solution, they took one look at the Danish 7-Eleven branded version of the Ziik social intranet – and liked what they saw. After an implementation and pilot period with the R-kioski support office, the solution was rolled out across the land of a thousand lakes.

In this article, R-kioski’s CIO & CDO, CPO Maria Sjöroos, Franchisee Jukka Vuollo and store employee Sanni Pettinen share their experiences of working with the social intranet software from Ziik.

Challenges before Ziik

Old-fashioned internal communication system

One of the major issues R-kioski had faced was an old-fashioned internal communication system. Or rather two. Initially, R-kioski had built their own Wordpress intranet. And while they could share handbooks, manuals, and other important documents here, it only allowed one-way communication. R-kioski wanted to enable their employees to ask questions and give feedback. This led to a two-year engagement with Facebook Workplace. But some major issues led them to start looking again. Maria Sjöroos explains: “Many of our store managers and sales persons still were not on Facebook, so that was a problem. And we still had to have all the handbooks on the old WordPress intranet. We received a lot of criticism from franchisees who were unhappy with working in two different systems.”

Jukka Vuollo, who was one of the franchisees, agrees: “One of the best things about the new system is that you don’t have to open different databases like we used to before.”

Cost efficiency - the final straw

Maria Sjöroos: “When we realized at the time there was no development for Workplace to become both a social platform and an intranet where we could keep handbooks, we began to think about looking for a new solution”. She adds: “And then, Workplace decided to change their licensing costs: If we wanted our employees to be able to access the platform on both our POS-computers and their mobile phones, the price went up quite a bit. So, in the end, it also became a cost efficiency issue to find a new solution. The decision wasn't that hard to make: We got something more convenient for a smaller price.”

Requirements for a new solutions

Access across different platforms

Sharing and updating handbooks, manuals and other important documents was a key requirement, as well as having the same environment across social functions like chat and groups to work documents. At the same time, it was important that the platform could be accessed on both Windows machines and mobile phones.

“Our POS-computers are Windows based. This allows us to have all kinds of interfaces there, too. And if you are a salesperson needing to check something, you might prefer checking it on your POS terminal instead of having to look at your phone while you're helping a customer. So, we needed that feature as well,” explains Maria Sjöroos.

Easy to use

After an implementation and test period, where Ziik was rolled out in R-kioski’s Support Office with 100 employees first, and then to selected stores, the platform was opened up to all employees in the beginning of 2021. Employees immediately hooked to the platform, finding it very easy to use. Store employee Sanni Pettinen explains: “It is very easy to use, because the user experience is really similar to other social media platforms, so it was easy to learn how to use it.”

Franchisee Jukka Vuollo also finds Ziik easy to use: “For the most part, you will find exactly what you are looking for there.”

Easier to get help

Sanni Pettinen also highlights how Ziik has made it easier for her and her colleagues to get help when they need it: “When I'm in the store, I use Ziik from the POS terminal, and I basically just browse the front page to find what I need. If any questions or problems occur at the store, I use a group specifically made for asking questions and where I can get an answer quickly.” Sanni and her colleagues also use Ziik to swap shifts: “I sometimes use the chat feature to find substitutes if a colleague has been taken ill.”

Increased engagement

In the words of store employee Sanni Pettinen: “I feel like the community spirit has increased”. Sanni also highlights that it’s fun to follow all the comments to posts. On a more serious note, CIO & CDO, CPO Maria Sjöroos can feel the increased engagement in the number of questions she gets about the company handbooks. “By contract, we must keep the company handbooks updated, and the franchisees must stay up to date with what’s in them. They cover important topics like store concepts, safety, health and so forth. Since launching Ziik, there is a lot more interest in them, and more questions and discussions about them.”  

A push to overhaul internal communications policies

One surprising consequence of bringing Ziik to the whole company has been that the amounts of messages that are posted are sometimes overwhelming. As Jukka says: “My employees say that it is sometimes challenging to use Ziik because of the number of messages and not so much because of the user interface itself.” Sanni agrees: “Sometimes information seems to be lost because there are so many posts each day.” Fortunately, Maria Sjöroos knows the reason: “When we launched, we simply imported all the same groups and company structures from the old intranet into Ziik. This has proven to give far too many messages, as people post across several groups at once. We are in the process of overhauling our internal communications processes because of this. You could say that launching Ziik has also been like holding a mirror to our own organization and finding things to improve and optimize. We see that clearly now.”

Collaboration with Ziik

CIO & CDO, CPO Maria Sjöroos considers the collaboration with Ziik a major win. “I think our collaboration, and their level of customer service, have been very good from the beginning of the project. We have many discussions about their platform, and I think sometimes they have been surprised by how we want to use it. But they listen to us, and we have a good dialogue. We have many wishes, and if they don’t have a solution for it straight away, they add it to their pipeline, and it gets done eventually. Of course, urgent issues are sorted out straight away.”