Shauna Switzer Ohio University 740.593.4712 [email protected] EDUCAUSE Midwest Regional Conference...

Shauna Switzer

Ohio University

740.593.4712

[email protected]

EDUCAUSE Midwest Regional Conference 2005

Univers IT y: Where Does Your IT Fit In?

mailto:[email protected]

• Copyright Shauna Switzer 2005. This work is the intellectual property of the author. Permission is granted for this material to be shared for non-commercial, educational purposes, provided that this copyright statement appears on the reproduced materials and notice is given that the copying is by permission of the author. To disseminate otherwise or to republish requires written permission from the author.

Ohio University

• Main campus in Athens: 19,704 students• Five regional campuses: 8,809 students• Total students: 28,513

• Faculty: 1,878• Staff: 2,942• Of the staff 230-240 are IT

(central, distributed, and help desk)

Ohio University Institutional Research Fall 2004 data

Ohio University Campus Profile

Ohio University Campus Profile

• IT to faculty/staff/student ratio:

139:1 user to overall IT

4,900:1 user to help desk ratio

(not including student help)

Falls mid- to slightly under mid-range when compared to 16 of our other sister universities

(T. Reid, personal communication, February 28, 2005)

(B.Sams, personal communication, February 28, 2005)

Research at Other Universities…

• Research by Hitch, Erskine, and Dancause (2004) at Northeastern University suggests that:

• Many IT staff’s previous work experience is not in higher education

• IT have not been trained on how their role fits in the ‘big’ picture or aligns with mission

• There is a need for professional development to help align their goals with those of the university

Ohio University IT Survey & Results

• Number of years at OU & previous work experience?

• Tasks and activities that support OU's mission do you work on during the work day?

• Who are your customers and how do you know you're doing a good job for them?

• What do you consider your strongest technical/non-technical skill?

• What skills do you want to acquire and why?

• How would you like your job responsibilities and professional development to evolve over the next five years?

Ohio University IT Survey

• Who do you team with most often to solve problems or offer services/how to make that teamwork more effective and efficient?

• What do you think the IT organization should be doing to serve its customers better and to anticipate the evolving need of the university?

• What question(s) do you think we should have asked you and didn't?

• Additional comments and contact information/ interested in helping further.

Ohio University IT Survey Results

30

26

6 64

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

0-5 6-10 11-15 16-20 21+

Years Worked by Employee

Tota

l Em

plo

yees

229 IT emailed72 Responded31% Response Rate

• Business (32%)

• IT (software, consulting, etc) (21%)

• K-12 (7%)

• Manufacturing (7%)

• Military (5%)

• Student (5%)

• Banking (4%)

• Newspaper (4%)

• Sales (2%)

• Other, self-employed (14%)

15

57

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

No Yes

Previously Worked in Higher Education

Tota

l Em

plo

yees

74% of respondents came from field other than higher education, such as:



Daily tasks that further the mission:

• Batch/Application support

• Maintain core network (backbone/wireless)

• Networking

• Programming Applications

• Security

• Support/Systems Admin/Policy

• Training/Support

• Web programming

• We have a mission?

Main themes:

• We all do many different and overlapping tasks.

• Everyone does many of the same tasks (from unjamming printers to server admin and security)

• We have a lot of customers both within the university as well as external.

• We have a large skill set and knowledge base here at the University that we need to tap into.

• We want to further develop our skills (both technical and otherwise).


• Communicate, communicate, communicate

• Share, share, share

• Promote teamwork and collaboration

• Develop our skills and stay current in the industry

• Have more networking opportunities, more training,

and more time and encouragement to attend them

• Work together NOT AGAINST each other


To condense the feedback into one comment:

“The biggest problem I have, and I'm sure many of my colleagues

share, is the sheer volume and diversity of what I am doing. I have

gone from training faculty on Video Conferencing, to setting up

computers in a lab, to clearing a copier jam, to repairing a projector,

to installing a sewing machine, to preparing Media for streaming, to

trying to learn MY SQL to rebuild a server, and that was all before 1

pm today. (And someone thought I took a long lunch, because I

wasn't in my office.)”

Anonymous quote


The Pilot Program

Behind the Screens: The Netizens, Knowledge Workers, and Silver Surfers of Ohio University

We all know who our customers are! They are the students, faculty and staff of Ohio University. But what does that really mean? Find out more about the diverse groups we serve and brainstorm ways we can avoid "anticipointments" in this pilot Professional Development course for OU's IT.

The Pilot Program


Netizen?

The Pilot Program


NetizenA citizen of the Internet, as in, one who spends a significant amount of time online or is an experienced user of the Net.

taken from http://www.netlingo.com

The Pilot Program


Knowledge Worker?

The Pilot Program


Knowledge WorkerQuite simply, it is a person who works in the industry. Most often, this person's job is to gather and disseminate information. A knowledge worker, however, can be anyone whose primary work responsibilities are centered on the use and manipulation of digital information, including stock traders, financial analysts, software programmers, and journalists, just to name a few.


The Pilot Program


Silver Surfer?

The Pilot Program

Silver SurferAn adult, generally 50 years of age or older, who frequently surfs the Web and spends time online ("silver" refers to the color of their hair). Unlike neophytes, silver surfers are considered netizens, experienced users of the Net. The phrase silver surfer … applies to midlife adults (generally those in their 40s, 50s and 60s), and seniors (age 70 and over) everywhere. By 2005, close to 108 million people will be over the age of 45 (which comprises 40 percent of the population).

Silver surfers: • Account for 70 percent of the U.S. net worth, controlling $9 trillion • Inherit over $12 trillion from their parents -- the largest wealth transfer in history • Control 80 percent of the personal financial assets • Represent 50 percent of U.S. discretionary spending • Own about 50 percent of all credit cards


The Pilot Program


Anticipointment?

The Pilot Program


AnticipointmentSlang for the feeling you get when a product or event does not live up to its own hype. For example, "Windows Me was said to be a huge anticipointment for users who upgraded from 2000."


‘Behind the Screens’ Pilot Program

• 8:00-9:00 ‘Eat and Greet’• 9:00-9:45 ‘The Netizens’, Dean of Students on

the student perspective• 10:00-10:45 ‘The Knowledge Workers’, newly

tenured Associate Professor on the faculty perspective

• 11:00-11:30 ‘The Silver Surfers’, Director of Maintenance and Operations for a staff perspective

• 11:30-12:00 discussion/wrap up

‘Behind the Screens’ Audience

• 72 total IT staff responded to the survey

• 43 agreed to future contact/willing to help

They were invited to our pilot program to provide further feedback

• 18 signed up and 14 were able to attend

• 8 of the 14 who attended filled out the online evaluation at the end

of the program

Faculty/Staff/Students by Generation

Generation Faculty, Staff, or Student? Nexters (1980-2000)

5-25 years old

GenXers (1961-1980)

25-44 years old

Baby Boomers (1943-1960)

45-62 years old

Veterans (1922-1943)

62-83 years old

Students (early 20’s)

Faculty (48)

Administrative Staff (43)

Classified Staff (46)Pay grade 93 < (53)

Zemke, R., Raines, C., Filipczak, B., (2000)Generations at work: Managing the clash of veterans, boomers, xers, and nexters in your workplace. New York: AMACOM Books.

IT Staff (41)

‘Behind the Screens’ Issues Identified

Faculty• Evaluated on 40:40:20

– 40% Research

– 40% Teaching

– 20% Service

• Evaluated on:– Number classes taught

– Number students taught

– Number advisees

– Number committees/groups

– Innovation in teaching

– Research and grant money

IT• Performance Management

– Define goals on yearly basis

align them with mission

– Mid-year review

– Final-year review

• Evaluated on:– Completion of goals

explain how/why not

Differences in Evaluation and Expectations


• Faculty grant writing for equipment (for promotion and tenure)

– Who supports it?

– Is there communication?

• Large, unplanned projects can easily affect IT workload (and evaluation if our performance management goals aren’t met)

• Create friction between faculty and IT


Friction?

Previous studies found that there were instances where faculty gave up grants to other institutions, as long as they maintain a significant role, because of lack of faith in current IT structure


Faculty• Evaluated on 40:40:20

– 40% Research

– 40% Teaching

– 20% Service

• Evaluated on:– Number classes taught

– Number students taught

– Number advisees

– Number committees/groups

– Innovation in teaching

– Research and grant money

IT• Performance Management

– Define goals on yearly basis

align them with mission

– Mid-year review

– Final-year review

• Evaluated on:– Completion of goals

explain how/why not

Differences in Evaluation and Expectations

Open ended model

Business model


Faculty

• Equipment used ranges from an old PC and Mac all the way up to a DNA sequencer

• Multiple platform

• Multiple generations

• Multiple applications

• Quirky old software and quirky old computers as well as rare, state-of-the-art equipment

IT

• Standardize

• Integrate

• Reduce redundancy

• Easier manageability and support that frees up time for the larger issues

Differences in Technology


Creative and innovative research that puts the university ‘on the map’

VS

Consolidation, standardization, and uniformity

Is it possible in higher education?How do we manage the diverging paths?

‘Behind the Screens’ Feedback

• The program received 6 positive and 2 negative votes. The approval rating was 73%, or 3.63 out of 5 stars. (77%, 3.86 stars if screened feedback)

• The discussion with the faculty member was by far the most mentioned and valued agenda item.

• The negatives were that they didn’t think it should be directed to an ‘IT only audience’ and that we should already know these things.

• The faculty member was very positive about the experience also. She said she also learned a lot from her interaction with the group.


• “The speakers really pointed out how diverse the IT community is and some challenges we must face. I found it very informative and felt it gave me a sense of perspective about the IT community here at OU.”

• “I think this program has a lot of potential impact on the university as a whole. As was mentioned in the meeting, IT personnel are too often ignored or taken for granted until a major problem arises. Prevention is always better (and cheaper) than damage control.”

• “Maybe a topic on how to make a presence in the planning process with regards to the purchase of new IT related systems. I'm sure not all faculty and staff personnel even think about including IT people and even the ones that do might resist the idea if they don't realize the potential benefits of IT staff inclusion.”

• “The presentations are all important issues that everyone at the university should be aware of.”


• “Hearing the perspective of someone from the academic side of things fist-hand.“

• “I liked the fact that 3 different audiences were presented one after the other. The connectedness helped contrast differing needs for and uses of technology on campus.”

• “While the faculty person realized the importance of their IT staff, the fact that they didn't even consider the potential increase of demand on the IT person when writing grants was surprising. It would be interesting to meet with a group of faculty to discuss what considerations go into grant writing. Does the faculty consider the full cost of ownership? If not, how can we, as IT, make them aware?”

Need More Communication

• We need more communication and teamwork within IT, and across all aspects of the university.

Ways of Opening Up Communication

• New mission and vision statement created by our CIO, and publicized

Implemented so far:


• ‘Communities of Practice’ – faculty, staff, IT, students… who get together to collaborate and communicate on a topic of interest.

– Communication

– Tablet PC

– Open Source

– Web Development

Implemented so far:


• Collaboration of IT and faculty to create a class “Technical Support in Educational Settings” to help train people who could be liaisons between faculty and IT. They may not be able to fix every problem, but the will be able to speak the language of both sides.

(M. Hyclak, personal communication, February 15, 2005)

Implemented so far:


• Encouragement and support from our CIO for IT to expand and learn about the academic side of higher education

– grant writing

– presenting

– research

Implemented so far:

Where Do We Go From Here?

• Comments or suggestion?

Shauna Switzer

Ohio University

[email protected]

740-593-4712

My Sources

City-Data.com. (n.d.). Retrieved March 10, 2005, from http://www.city-data.com/city/Athens-Ohio.html

Discover Ohio. (n.d.). Retrieved March 17, 2005, from http://www.discoverohio.com/visitors/map.asp

Hitch, L., Erskine, P., & Dancause, B. (2004). Filling a void in IT professional development: Understanding higher education. EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research(ECAR) Research Bulletin, 2004(12)14. Retrieved March 13, 2004 from http://www.educause.edu/ResearchBulletins/1007

NetLingo dictionary of Internet terms. (n.d.). Retrieved February 17, 2005, from http://netlingo.com/

Arbogast, W. (2003). Technology Service Excellence: A proposed technology service model for Ohio University. Washington, DC: ideaReserve, LLC.

Staff Statistics – Fall 2004 (2004). Retrieved March 10, 2005, from Ohio University, Office of Institutional Research Web site: http://www.ohiou.edu/instres/student/quartenroll/index.html

Zemke, R., Raines, C., Filipczak, B., (2000) Generations at work: Managing the clash of veterans, boomers, xers, and nexters in your workplace. New York: AMACOM Books.

Photos courtesy of Ohio University Photographer, Rick Fatica, and Shauna Switzer.

Special Thanks to Bill Sams, CIO and Ann Kovalchick, Director of CITL, Ohio University

Shauna Switzer Ohio University 740.593.4712 [email protected] EDUCAUSE Midwest Regional Conference...

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