CIO Web Musings

Last year, the University of Illinois embarked on a new strategic planning process that will allow us, in the words of our new president, "to create a vibrant future for this great institution." An executive summary for the strategic plan has been produced, which in fact summarizes the Stage 2 campus plans and related university-level plans. Currently, the colleges and units are completing their more in-depth plans, according to a road map prepared by the president. That is, the plans have gone from broader, more institutional conceptualizations and measures to more and more specific plans as we move from university to campus to colleges and units. But now for something completely different!

Last fall (or even earlier), I broached the notion of having a campus-wide information technologies strategic plan for the Urbana-Champaign campus be developed in a "relay" fashion, where we (metaphorically speaking) "run alongside" the colleges and units as they put the finishing touches on their plans (this spring), and then begin our sprint to the finish line (next December) with a strategic plan that involves all the colleges in an open, comprehensive way. The notion is to create an IT Strategic Plan that makes explicit the implicit IT needs in the college plans, that develops clear strategies for the explicit needs, and that, at the same time, develops in a coherent way a common vision for information technologies on the campus. Let me talk briefly about each of these things.

Let me say at the outset that the mission here is to create a campus vision, not a centralized information technology vision. This is not merely politic, it is essential. There are many things, to be sure, that are best done centrally-- notably things that are pervasive, that are very expensive, or that have policy or institutional responsibilities that are both complex and out of scope for most units. At the same time, there are things that must be done at the college or unit level to be successful; these are often activities that require substantial faculty innovation or leadership, that are or must be supported on a small scale, or that are just cheaper or more flexibly done on a smaller, more intimate scale. But as important as these is the best option of all: hybrid capabilities or services born of partnership. There are many, many things that must be done as a partnership between units and larger entities like colleges (college offices) or central IT organizations; these include modular services, where there are parts that are best done centrally (identity management, say) and parts that are very specific (research systems that tie to central services). So, even if one were to say some things must be done centrally and some must be done in a distributed fashion, my vision is that the most important things are those that can be modularized or segmented as building blocks, some of which are central, secure, and bullet-proof and some of which are innovations throughout the academic enterprise.

So, let's first talk about why it's important to make explicit the implicit IT demands and needs from the college plans within a Campus IT Strategic Plan. Well, this is an easy one to explain (and hard to do!). First and most significantly, individuals with a vision for academic programs may not understand the complexity or cost of the IT portion-- it may be easy to say (or even just to assume): "Just add a 10 gigabit, fault-tolerant, 5-nines reliable network to all these locations and we can serve all those students (or clinicians or what have you)," yet that assumption could be an order of magnitude more costly than the faculty component of the program!

The important thing is that the faculty and college administrators should be free to develop their vision without the (frankly, rather distracting) task of figuring out all aspects of how to achieve their vision in IT terms (or in terms of library impact or other synergistic groups). Just as importantly, even though departments will try very hard to anticipate IT issues, they may not do so with sufficient detail to develop effective costs and measures; even more so, they may not (nor should they) understand the various approaches one could take to provide the capability they are looking for. This recalls the old adage from computer centers since the Stone Ages-- the faculty members state their problems in research, educational or other academic terms and the IT folks identify solutions in technology terms (ok, this is simplistic, but you get the point).

All this being true, we expect the colleges to do an awfully good job at making IT needs and issues explicit, weaving these issues expertly into their college narratives and measures. In fact, we hope to build on the excellent work they are doing. But each college may not be aware of common threads and IT-interplay among the colleges or even the commonality among similar threads within the colleges, so the Campus IT Strategic Plan will play a crucial role in integrating the various IT needs across the colleges in a way that identifies common infrastructure, capabilities and services and that proposes mechanisms for providing those. Again, the goal is not to "roll up" these needs into central services. Put simply, the goal is to make sure they are clearly identified and to make some recommendations as to how best to provide them. In most cases, I would hazard to guess, the recommendations will be for "building block" services that combine strengths within units, within colleges, across colleges (perhaps just two or three), and at the campus or university levels.

Finally, last and in some respects most and least, the IT Strategic Plan must provide an overall vision for the information technologies programs (and concomitant investment) on the campus. I say "least," because the most effective IT plan will have an exemplary strategy for addressing college needs, but some of the best academic goals will be achieved with IT solutions that are "good practices" and "well thought out," without necessarily being best-of-breed or innovative solutions. Some things will emphasize agility or faculty innovation over IT innovation. That is not only acceptable, but it is absolutely necessary.

I say "most" because in other aspects, however, we all recognize that leadership in Information Technologies is critical to the success of any campus, but most of all campuses like Illinois with a long history of leadership in both IT-related research and in the integration of IT into the research, scholarship, performance, and educational fabric of the campus. So, in some respects, the campus IT Strategic plan must show where we want to be in the medium-term and do so in such a way that it is a bold and exhilirating reach for a higher rung on the ladder (or even a leap to the next ladder), but with a substantive and detailed road map that gives us confidence we are not merely leaping into thin air. Universities are inherently conservative, so the balance between a vision for boldness and the need to proceed with fiscal prudence and a modicum of consensus is a delicate one-- but one we must find.

So, who will develop this Campus Information Technology Strategic Plan? Right now, the colleges are completing their draft plans and we hope to begin soon to review and synthesize key issues from the plans within the campus IT Advisory Board. This is the relay race, where the college folks hand "us" (i.e. hand other college folks and a few central IT leaders) the baton, and we begin the next phase. Current plans are for the the chair of the IT Advisory Board, the CIO (me), and a dean or similar academic leader to come together as a steering team to direct the full synthesis and visioning process, involving faculty from around the campus, but building critically on our first-rate IT Advisory Board membership. Using central and college IT experts as "staff" to the committee (i.e. helping organize the technical issues and solutions), the faculty involved will identify college goals with implicit and explicit IT needs and help shape a coherent campus-wide strategy for meeting those needs and measurably enhancing the ability to meet those goals.

Finally, ensuring a balance among the academic priorities already laid out in the campus and university strategic plans, we will document a common vision for information technologies as defined above.

While the basic plan will be developed over the summer and into early fall, we will invite broad participation from the campus in refining, redirecting, and enhancing the plan through a transparent information-sharing process, focus groups or town meetings with faculty, staff, and students, coordination and communication through college representatives at the IT Advisory Board, and information-sharing with the deans and associate deans (not to mention, constant communication with the administration, which after all must embrace the vision and understand how the information technology investments catalyze or otherwise crucially enable the college and unit academic goals).

In summary, the Campus Information Technologies Strategic Plan is a key component of a campus strategic planning process. At the same time, it is a different beast, in that its value comes from making explicit the implicit, seeing patterns of commonality that spread across the college plans like threads in a tapestry, and must at the same time have its own story of innovation and creativity that contributes in very special ways to the intellectual strengths of the University of Illinos. Echoing President White, through a well-crafted and inclusive strategic planning process, it is our task to lay out the critical catalytic role that Information Technologies will play in creating a vibrant future for this great institution!