How Go Links can save you headaches at work

It’s that time of year again: the leaves are changing, the air is crisper, and open enrollment season has begun. You’ve thought about changing your elections, but other things have come up—meetings, presentations, a couple of urgent to-do items. Before you know it, it’s the day enrollment closes, and you’re still not sure if you want to opt into the PPO. You’d like to read up on your employer’s plan, but you’re not able to locate the open enrollment email in your inbox, and calls to your HR rep are going to voicemail. You can’t find the resources you need because you can’t quite remember where they are.

Wouldn’t it be nice if there were a short, memorable URL that took you directly to your company’s benefits hub—and the information you needed? 

Well, with Go Links, it really can be that easy. This system, popularized by Google, enables the creation of intuitive URLs using the format go/link. The idea behind Go Links is that everyone on staff will be able to remember and find the info they need because the link to the material is so simple. In fact, Go Links work best when any team or person can create one and share it within the company without needing help or permission from IT. This keeps teams nimble and collaborative, allowing smaller teams to have their own Go Links that matter only to them. It also frees up more time for IT and end users to focus on getting work done instead of searching for resources.

So, let’s say you’re still trying to figure out your benefits elections for the year. Using Go Links, the open enrollment information would be available at go/benefits, which you’d be able to recall and access efficiently without having to sift through your inbox or call HR. Plus, because everyone can remember that go/benefits is the place to find benefits info, the effort the HR team put into developing and writing the materials won’t be wasted. Instead, more people will read it once they can actually remember where it is.

Go Links can be used for more than just a benefits portal, though. New hires could find all of the information they need, including employee handbooks and onboarding checklists, at go/onboarding. That would be a one-stop shop that gives them easy access to all of a company’s resources, including items new hires might have missed at an onboarding event. Joining a team is tough enough without having to wade through paper packets, online forms, and introductory emails. Go Links allow new hires to hit the ground running without the stress of having to find the race course.

Sales teams are constantly struggling to ensure their materials are up to date. Nothing screams “unprepared” like having outdated messaging in a pitch deck for a big potential customer. But if the latest pitch is always available at go/sales-deck, it's easy for reps to stay on the same page. Everyone can access the resources they need, cutting down on wasted time—and headaches.

If you want to bring the power of Go Links into your organization, you can. The Go Links feature is now available as part of the Glean work assistant. To learn more about how to make and use Go Links, check out our help center article. Remember that, to use Go Links, you’ll need to download the Glean browser extension. Once you start using Go Links, you’ll never want to go back to the old way of hunting and pecking through company resources. Even when the seasons—and employee needs—change, Go Links will be evergreen.