How AWO is improving collaboration with Haiilo

With more than 3,000 employees across over 80 facilities at 35 locations, AWO Bezirksverband Unterfranken e.V. is one of the largest social welfare organisations in the region. The nature of AWO’s business means many staff are working without a permanent desk, therefore ensuring reliable communication across the organisation while accessing knowledge and collaborating between facilities and groups was a major challenge.  

With AWORLD, an intranet built on Haiilo, AWO Unterfranken has created a shared digital space for information, communication, and collaboration. The result: employees receive information much faster, teams can collaborate more easily across locations, and several departments spend significantly less time in meetings.

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The Challenge: Many Locations, Roles, and Communication Channels

AWO’s decentralised structure is one of its strengths, but it also made internal communication more difficult.

Employees working at different locations and in different professional groups had few opportunities to meet, learn from one another, or share knowledge. Information from headquarters had to pass through several communication layers before reaching frontline employees, making the process slow and inefficient.

At the same time, much of the organisation's communication relied on email. As a result, many employees had limited visibility into what was happening outside their own facility or immediate area of responsibility.

AWO therefore needed a solution that would help:

• Inform all locations faster

• Enable communication across different teams

• Encourage knowledge sharing

• Increase employee participation and engagement

Why Haiilo Was Chosen

What convinced AWO was Haiilo's broad range of communication and collaboration capabilities, its mobile app, and its highly configurable user interface.

At launch, the organisation deliberately chose a simplified and user-friendly interface. This made it easier for employees with limited technical experience to get started. Thanks to Haiilo's straightforward configurable design, the communications team can independently adapt and expand the platform without relying on IT resources or external service providers for every change.

“What convinced us most about Haiilo was the platform’s versatility. Besides the many communication options, it also provides us with excellent tools for digital collaboration. Furthermore, Haiilo’s user-friendly interface can be flexibly customized – a real highlight for us.”

Stefana Körner, Internal Communications Specialist at AWO Unterfranken

How AWO Uses Haiilo

Employees themselves selected the platform name through an internal competition.

Today, AWORLD serves three primary purposes:

1. Information

Important news, updates and company knowledge are available to employees in one central location. It even connects to external systems such as SharePoint, so from one hub employees can access all their information.

2. Communication

The platform supports communication between headquarters and facilities, enables dialogue across professional groups, and facilitates local communication within individual locations.

3. Collaboration

Departments, facility managers and project teams work together on documents and coordinate initiatives, including construction projects managed by the real estate department.

Frequently used features include:

• Custom departmental pages

• Chats

• Surveys

• Forms

The Results: Faster Communication and More Efficient Alignment

Before AWORLD was introduced, it often took one to two days for important information to reach frontline employees.

Today, AWO can distribute important updates instantly with just a few clicks. In some departments, meeting durations have been reduced by 50%.

Haiilo delivers several key benefits for the organisation:

Faster Information Distribution

Important updates no longer take one or two days to reach employees. Information is available immediately.

More Efficient Coordination

Some departments have reduced the duration of meetings by half.

Better Cross-Location Collaboration

More than 3,000 employees across 35 locations now share a central platform for information, communication, and collaboration.

Greater Flexibility for the Communications Team

The platform can be adapted and expanded internally without needing to involve IT teams or external service providers for every change.

Better Inclusion of Different Employee Groups

Even frontline employees are fully included in any company wide communication and can access company knowledge wherever they are.

“Thanks to Haiilo, we are now much more successful at reaching and involving our employees. As a result, we are growing closer together as an organisation.”

Stefana Körner, Internal Communications Specialist at AWO Unterfranken

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