Case study: the Hyundai Plus communication portal

Even large manufacturing companies like Hyundai face internal communication challenges. The most common issues are misinformation, fragmented communication or late delivery of information. Other common problems include, for example, the lack of feedback. How can such challenges be effectively addressed?

Hyundai and the starting point

The company started mass production in 2008 and has now reached another milestone of 4,000,000 cars produced. The company takes excellent care of its current 3,252 employees, but avoiding the struggle of unifying internal communication and the number of communication channels is almost impossible with such a large number of employees. The solution was a corporate app called Hyundai Plus, which took the place of the company’s main communication channel.

What were the expectations?

The company set as its main improvement goal the elimination of misinformation and the ability to inform its employees in the shortest possible time. Other expectations included increasing employee engagement in company events, making the app available 24/7, adapting to mobile and desktop viewing, or having the app support the company brand. Of course, ease of use (i.e. that every employee could use the app actively and on their own) and integration to current data sources were also a priority.

Implementation process

To be able to create an app that employees would love, we needed to find out what they actually wanted. Discussions were then held in the form of internal workshops, and through a survey, a name began to be coined. Another important point to address was to project and promote the company brand in the app. Subsequently, the planned integration to internal systems took place. The testing group was also involved in the implementation process. Today, the app is going through 4 phases of development, working with the needs of the people involved.

Positive impacts

Employee involvement in communication

Thanks to the new corporate application, 96% of all employees have been engaged overall. Traffic to the app is around 3,000 users per week, which means approximately 93% of all people in the company. As for the daily average, it depends on whether it is a working day or a weekend. On weekdays, Hyundai Plus is visited by an average of 1,400 users, and then around 650 on the weekend. Peak traffic is recorded between 8am and 2pm. And the fact that 82% of all visits are made via mobile devices proves that it pays to have a communication portal in the form of a mobile app.

Improvements

Employees should be able to influence the way things are done in the company in order to be satisfied. The improvements that employees can make in the app serve this purpose. Prior to the launch of the Nchanger program on Hyundai Plus, a total of 54 improvements were submitted quarterly in 2019. Two years later, in 2021, the flow of improvement submissions has risen dramatically to 841 ideas from 271 authors, with 403 being deemed good.

Achievements and next steps

Thanks to the new communication portal, the company was able to consolidate information or simplify and better target communication. There has also been a reduction in administration and an increase in employee loyalty. The goals that the company had set for itself were therefore successfully met. The fact that Hyundai came second in the Golden Semicolon 2020/21 in the Mobile Apps and Innovation category with the Plusco app is proof of this. But it’s not good to rest on our laurels, so we are constantly working with Hyundai on new features that could continue to push their communication portal forward.

What about your internal communications?

Is your company struggling with communication issues and you don’t know how to get out of them? We are happy to help you with our HR consulting services. And if Plusco has appealed to you and you’re keen to have your own corporate communications app, we also offer a consultation to implement Plusco to suit your individual needs.