Finding new ways to teach, learn and discover University of Greenwich Information and Technology Strategy 2013 – 2017 Contents ‘It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change’ Charles Darwin University strategy st Page 2 3 21 Century context 4 Driving principles 5 Seven strategic IT areas 6 1 – Learning and teaching 7 2 – Research and enterprise 8 3 – Community and experience 9 4 – Enterprise solutions 10 5 – Infrastructure 11 6 – Governance, compliance and security 12 7 – Service, support and change 13 Resources 14 Indicative programme 15 University of Greenwich Foreword from the Vice Chancellor Information Technology is crucially important to much of what we do at the university. This strategy outlines how we will harness the power of technology to enhance our learning and teaching and research and enterprise. It also describes how we will improve the services and infrastructure that make the university work by upgrading the underpinning technology. All this will require considerable investment, which we judge to be essential to our future success. I encourage all staff to engage positively with this IT strategy and shape its implementation so that it best meets our future needs. Professor David Maguire Vice-Chancellor University Strategy The university has developed a five year Strategic Plan (through to 2017), which sets a challenging and aspirational agenda for the future of the institution. This, together with related internal strategies, a changing external environment and rapidly evolving technology have driven the context of the IT Strategy. Our mission is; to inspire society through the discovery, application and dissemination of knowledge Our vision is; by 2017, we will have an enhanced reputation as a leading London university The Strategic Plan articulates four key strategic objectives, which are outlined to the right. The IT Strategy uses these objectives and identifies where technology can positively contribute to achieving the goals contained within each objective. Page 3 1 – Learning and teaching Maximising the individual potential and satisfaction of students through outstanding learning and teaching. 2 – Research and enterprise Enhancing our capability as a research informed and enterprising institution which produces international quality research and knowledge exchange. 3 – Community and experiences Creating a strong sense of community and ensuring that all associated with the university have great experiences. 4 – Services and infrastructure Building effective, efficient and sustainable services and an infrastructure that supports the university’s activities. IT Strategy 21st Century context The level of expectation of IT in 2012 is unrecognisable when compared to only a few years ago. IT is embedded into all aspects of life and work – a pervasive business enabler which is available from anywhere on any device at any time. Widely available solutions for personal and home use on a variety of mobile devices mean both students and staff expect university IT systems and services to perform to the same standard. This is the reality and the challenge, and the university must respond. Big data and rich media. The complexity of online content, whether it be high volume structured data, streamed lectures or YouTube resources, has become a game changer for IT. This directly impacts on the sourcing and location of infrastructure, network capacity and the way in which it is managed and supported. Compliance. We must be cognisant of statutory requirements within the sector, internal and external audit and legal compliance. Security and information assurance. The open and largely permissive IT environment within the university makes us susceptible to external threats. This requires active risk management. Page 4 Online self-service processes. Students and staff do not expect to have to deal with paper, queue at a desk or telephone in order to interact with the university or carry out core processes. Always available. 24*7*365 availability is expected but must be balanced against what is affordable. Any modern IT driven business must take resilience, distribution and disaster recovery very seriously. Off-site delivery models. IT is becoming more commoditised, with systems and modular services available via the cloud, managed and hosted services and via shared services. University of Greenwich Driving principles Information and Library Services will continue to enhance the way in which IT is procured, developed, implemented, maintained and supported. We see IT as an enabler of the university mission and vision, with strong centrally provided services, developed and implemented collaboratively and deployed and managed locally wherever possible. The principles are defined to provide a framework and guide for the management of information technology across the university, and are an important element of ensuring the continued development and operation of our IT environment is effective and coherent. Service orientated. We will work with Faculties and Offices to facilitate consistent, effective and efficient processes which are fully service orientated rather than organisation orientated. Integrated data. Data should be integrated rather than repeated, with a common meta model for data used wherever possible. Where appropriate, central data will be provided for local re-use to avoid parallel storage and repetition. Secure and compliant operating environment. All aspects of the implementation, management and support of IT will adhere to industry standard principles in relation to information management and security. Sustainability. Information and Library Services has a large role to play in ensuring IT infrastructure choices positively contribute to carbon reduction targets, therefore helping the university maintain its position as one of the greenest universities in the UK (according to the People and Planet Green League Table). Professionalism and skills. We will invest time and resources into the development of professional IT staff, to ensure they possess the right skills and capabilities to deliver on the IT Strategy. Page 5 Adaptive and flexible. We will aim to implement solutions which provide an excellent customer experience by being flexible and responsive, so that the IT environment can adapt to changing demand over time. Best practice systems and services. Wherever possible industry and sector standard solutions will continue to be preferred. Industry standard operating environment. Good practice approaches to project management, service management and governance will be further embedded throughout the university. Experimentation and innovation. Capacity will be created to collaborate with Faculties and Offices to enable development and innovation. Standards and architecture. The development of consistent standards and a common understanding of the IT environment are key to ensuring the IT Strategy is implemented. Simplified. In an increasingly complex IT world we will aim to abstract the complexity for users, ensuring the systems and services are as simple as possible, with straightforward user interfaces. Service. We aim to provide an excellent service. IT queries and problems will be resolved as quickly as possible, with a target of 80% for “first time fix rate” by the end of the planning period. IT Strategy Seven strategic areas for IT Following the development of the Strategic Plan and consultation with staff around the university, the IT Strategy has been broken down into the following areas. Each area has a page within the strategy which in each case defines; What we will deliver What outcomes will be achieved What measures of success will be assessed The Strategic IT areas are; 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Learning and teaching Research and enterprise Community and experience Enterprise solutions Infrastructure Governance, compliance and security Service, support and change The IT Strategy articulates an ambitious agenda that will require additional resources, which are outlined in summary at the end of the document. Additionally, an indicative programme is provided which identifies the high level scheduling of the various development and implementation programmes. Page 6 University of Greenwich 1 Learning and teaching We will place the student experience and the academic staff who provide their teaching at the centre of our work, helping students to learn interactively and effectively. The IT strategy will actively support the technology-enhanced requirements of the learning, teaching and assessment strategy. National Student Survey results covering IT and learning resources are consistently above both university and sector averages – we will incrementally aim to increase this position. We have invested in staffing resources specifically in order to develop the IT and learning resource services, with the majority of the emphasis on academic facing services. The high level activities covering learning and teaching are; Technology enhanced learning environment, providing an integrated and personalised suite of systems and services which can be accessed consistently from anywhere on any device. Improved e-learning. Building on the implementation of Moodle, we will work with all stakeholders to develop the Greenwich Connect e-learning strategy in order to improve the richness of the Virtual Learning Environment (and other associated tools) and significantly increase the level and quality of adoption. Teaching space technology will continue to be improved and maintained at a high standard, by introducing a rolling programme of maintenance and improvement. Adoption and use of classroom technology will be increased via a programme of training. Page 7 Lecture capture, streaming and podcasting will be researched and investigated via pilot early in the planning period with a view to university wide rollout if successful. Ease of use, publishing and deployment will be key. Academic resource discovery will be implemented, which will allow federated searching across physical holdings and electronic subscription academic resources, databases and journals as well as free to use open and external resources, such as Google Scholar. This will enable the blending of the boundary between e-learning and the library. Student support will be integrated and delivered consistently, with a selfservice knowledge base provided and remote support tools adopted by support engineers. The Stockwell Street library will be available from 2014/15 and contain flexible and modern technology to support learning and teaching. Outcomes Modern, industry standard and easy to use learning and teaching technology environment. Subject specific applications and resources are available in sufficient quantity. High quality IT support service. High quality, flexible technology enhanced learning spaces, with a personalised learning environment providing a range of learning resources and student facing services, available online on any smart device. Measures of success National Student Survey results for IT and learning resources incrementally increase and remain above average; acting as a barometer for the student perspective of our services. Easier to discover resources and improved e-learning will positively impact student success and degree classification. Student IT enquiries are resolved at the point of origin in 80% of cases. All courses are augmented with high quality e-learning content. IT Strategy 2 Research and Enterprise Historically there have been limited resources provided specifically in support of research. With the strategic aim to increase both research and enterprise income and outputs a range of systems and services will be implemented to support the university in its goal. Outcomes Research administration will continue to improve, with bid management and workflow, reporting, costing and signoff being provided, as well as additional tools to assist with project and milestone management. High Performance Computing requirements will be explored with relevant research groups to achieve economies of scale and to facilitate computer processing resources for entry level researchers. Research active staff receive a proactive, prompt and bespoke service when required. Rich research information portal content will be provided to enable academic staff to better understand how to become research active, and how to develop and submit proposals to funding bodies. Academic resource discovery will allow both subscription and open access resources to be interrogated, searched and discovered using a single, integrated system. Atypical computing requirements will be facilitated by creating flexible and adaptive support processes which allow research requirements to be effectively captured and enabled. Research output management via the repository (GALA) will continue to be enhanced. Page 8 Online collaborative tools will be provided which will allow research activity and projects to be managed and research staff to share information and collaborate. Online content located on the website which describes the university’s research and our researchers will be significantly improved. Research life cycle management and administration is effective and efficient. Provision of business intelligence to support research management at all levels as well as project monitoring. Rich and comprehensive online research information to support communication and dissemination of the university’s research activity and output. Measures of success Increased positive bid rate without proportional increase in back office resources. Bespoke research requirements can be provisioned effectively and efficiently using centrally managed infrastructure. University of Greenwich 3 Community and Experience Information technology has a significant role to play in facilitating a sense of community, through the dissemination of information, provision of collaborative and social software and enabling effective communication. The University web site will be redeveloped, focussing on look and feel, modernisation and the breadth of content it contains. Ownership and responsibility for content creation and management will be devolved to Faculties and Offices. A mobile framework will be implemented which will provide a range of applications and services via all of the common mobile and tablet platforms. The current portal and intranet will be evaluated early in the planning period and a strategy and implementation plan produced which identifies the next generation approach to internal online content and self-service system deployment. Communications technology to support collaboration, teleconferencing, mobile and peripatetic working and online presentation will be implemented, built on the voice over IP (VOIP) digital telephone system. Ensure effective change management in relation to implementation of new and amended processes and systems. Page 9 Social networking, collaboration and blogging tools are a part of the modern technology landscape, and offer a vehicle to communicate and collaborate within a more open and public context. Key tools, for example Facebook, Twitter and Google Docs, will be investigated and integrated into Moodle to allow tutors to interact with students in their own space. Best practice advice will be developed to allow students and staff to use the tools in a productive and safe manner. Staff and student communities will be facilitated by technology, using online tools to develop networks, facilitating work, learning and social interaction. This will be investigated within the development of the Greenwich Connects e-learning strategy. Facilitate improved staff development across the university via the enhancement of online content, courses and services relating to training and development. Outcomes A university web site which is rich, engaging and effective for all university stakeholders. The development of modern social technology continues to be explored, exploited and appropriately woven into university systems and communication practice. Students and staff are able to access systems and services via any device. The next generation portal technology is implemented, and provides a modern, consistent platform for internal content and service delivery. The use of modern communication tools is embedded within the university. Measures of success The web site is considered in the top ten within the UK Higher Education sector. The staff engagement survey identifies an improvement in communication within the university. Portal usage statistics for students remain high (>98%) and qualitative feedback is positive. IT Strategy 4 Enterprise solutions The university possesses a good foundation of integrated business systems which perform satisfactorily across the institution. Over the next five years, the emphasis will be orientated towards process enhancement and efficiency to ensure administrative processes are optimised to be as effective as possible. Outcomes Office automation will be improved by implementing document management and workflow. The majority of processes will be carried out online via a selfservice model. Smart card technology will be implemented providing an integrated identity card enabling access and control, cashless processes and attendance monitoring. Relationship management software (CRM) will be investigated with a view to providing an integrated student life cycle communication management environment, allowing Faculties and Offices to communicate with applicants and students via a single environment. The Library Management System has been reviewed with a recommendation to either replace or re-implement within the period of the strategy. Business processes across the university will be evaluated and improved, with an emphasis on developing simple and integrated processes spanning key organisational areas and systems. Principles of automation, data and service integration and self-service will be paramount. Faculty organisation. Processes contained within the Faculties will be developed in order that optimal value, effectiveness and economy of scale can be achieved Business intelligence will develop over the lifetime of the strategy with decision makers defining the phasing of the development. This will provide analytics via aggregate reports and dashboards covering all aspects of the institution. Student participation data will be brought together in the data warehouse to facilitate predictive analytics, allowing tutors to understand student trajectory and to target interventions where necessary. All core business processes will be optimised and represent best possible value for money. The office environment will be automated as far as possible, with the use of paper reduced to a minimum and documents available from anywhere on any device. Decision makers will have current and relevant information available to facilitate informed decision making. Applicant and student communications are personalised, appropriate and stored in a central repository (but used locally). Measures of success National Student Survey indicators for organisation and management continue to improve. The cost of administration within the university is reduced in real terms. Business intelligence means the right decisions are made at the right time, making the university a more effective organisation. Page 10 University of Greenwich 5 Infrastructure Over recent years the university has embarked on a programme of IT infrastructure modernisation; for example, the implementation of digital telephony, a single Windows 7 desktop environment and significant server consolidation. The next five years will see further simplification and modernisation, providing an industry standard operating environment which is adaptive, reliable, secure and scalable. The data network will continue to be developed to ensure it provides a high availability and high performance foundation for the computing needs of the university. The wireless service will be further developed to ensure it can meet significant growth in demand whilst maintaining an excellent service. Modern wireless technology will enable high density use within lecture theatres, facilitating the innovative use of teaching technology. Resilience will continue to be at the heart of the infrastructure capital replacement strategy, ensuring the maximum possible level of service availability, with critical systems distributed between Greenwich and Medway. Cloud, hosted, managed and shared service infrastructure and system delivery models will be adopted wherever it is functionally and economically appropriate. The desktop and underpinning systems environment will use Microsoft based industry standard technology to provide a familiar and integrated user experience. Page 11 The concept of bring your own device (BYOD) will be fully implemented to enable the university to support the majority of end point devices with seamless and consistent support. Key to this will be the full implementation of application virtualisation, which will enable a secure and consistent user experience to be deployed to any device. A desktop strategy will be developed to consider the approach and financial model for student and staff desktop device replacement. Server consolidation will continue to be implemented throughout the institution to reduce complexity and cost and increase power utilisation efficiency. Advanced communications will be implemented, which will build on the roll out of digital telephony by integrating modern voice orientated functions into the desktop environment. This will facilitate peripatetic and mobile working. Outcomes High quality modern IT infrastructure and systems environment which meets the needs of the institution and is adaptive, scalable, reliable and secure. Students and staff are able to use any endpoint device (managed or personally owned) and receive applications and services delivered and supported consistently and securely. Disaster recovery procedures are high quality, subject to regular testing and contribute positively to institutional business continuity capabilities. Active end to end management of the systems and infrastructure life cycle will ensure optimal value and use are achieved for all hardware and software assets. The data network (wired and wireless) meets the needs of a modern university and has increased bandwidth onto the Janet backbone, facilitating increased connections and media rich content. Measures of success Service availability across all IT infrastructure, services and systems exceeds 99.5%. Systems failure, unplanned downtime, major security incidents and denial of service attacks are kept to a minimum or do not occur. Significant increase in communications and remote working capability is a catalyst to creating a connected and mobile workforce. IT Strategy 6 Governance, compliance and security To ensure the IT strategy delivers on its goals it will be necessary to implement a formal governance structure which will have oversight of the IT environment and make sure programmes and projects are strategically aligned, appropriate resources are available and outcomes are monitored. Approaches to security and internal operating procedures will be strengthened to ensure risks are properly managed and the university successfully meets its IT audit and compliance requirements. A formal IT governance structure (IT Strategy Steering Group) will be implemented which will be chaired by a member of the Vice Chancellor’s Group (VCG) with membership drawn from senior staff across the institution. It will report into VCG. The terms of reference will include; defining programme area priorities, ensuring alignment with the Strategic Plan, provision of resources and monitoring of the strategy and associated KPI’s. A developer network will be created to facilitate crossinstitutional collaboration, development, innovation and experimentation using tools and techniques which can be deployed for the benefit of stakeholders across the institution. User groups and forums will be created to facilitate communication and dissemination and the sharing of good practice. Page 12 Staff and student practice in relation to information assurance and security will continue to be enhanced via regular communication, online documentation and training. Policies and procedures covering all aspects of the management and delivery of IT services will be consistently produced and embedded to ensure that the IT operating environment is secure, compliant and fit for purpose. Regular internal security audits will continue to be undertaken to ensure that vulnerabilities are discovered and corrected proactively. Good practice IT project management techniques will be embedded throughout the institution, ensuring all staff that have project leadership responsibility possess requisite skills and capabilities. A particular focus will be ensuring that project benefits are effectively realised. Outcomes The IT operating environment is effective, secure and compliant and meets the needs of the university. Projects are run effectively ensuring expected outcomes, savings and benefits are delivered. There is a culture of shared ownership for IT within the university, with rich and engaging user groups and networks facilitating development, enhancement and the sharing of good practice. All staff fully understand and are effective users of the IT systems and services they need to use to do their job. Measures of success Staff and students are more effective in their work and learning. Survey and feedback responses are positive and improve over time. Programme areas and projects are delivered on time, to budget and fully realise planned outcomes and expectations. Data level security breaches are avoided. Internal and external audit reports do not contain significant recommendations. University of Greenwich 7 Service, support and change Industry good practice IT service delivery will be implemented, providing an excellent IT support environment which will be expert, responsive and professional, with an emphasis on high initial resolution of IT incidents. The integrated IT Helpdesk function will be further developed to ensure all IT, Library and classroom requests covering staff and students are handled promptly and accurately, with a well understood, consistent and repeatable operating model. This will be underpinned by the use of the industry best practice service delivery methodology (ITIL), which will provide a common framework for handling all aspects of IT support. A service catalogue will be developed and maintained which will classify and enable the effective communication of all IT services, their access and use. Change management focussed resource will be made available to ensure new IT systems and services are properly embedded across the institution so that benefits are realised from projects and best value is achieved. Page 13 All routine service requests will be classified and the responsibility moved from various IT teams to an integrated first line support function, providing a high “first time fix” rate and a better service. This will remove repetitive tasks from other areas of IT which will enable more focus for development and enhancement work. A knowledge base will be developed which contains information for IT support staff to enable effective and consistent resolution of incidents and for users to access online to enable selfservice issue resolution where possible. Second Line Support will continue to provide reactive office support when required, but additionally will provide proactive support, identify IT needs and facilitate induction and training for new tools and services – providing a business relationship function between the IT service and the university. Outcomes The IT support service is efficient, effective, meets its targets and is well regarded by students and staff. Staff and students are provided with a range of materials which describe and communicate the IT services as well as how they are accessed and supported. IT systems and services are fully embedded into the university, ensuring best possible value is achieved and benefits are realised. The IT support service moves from being passive and reactive to proactive and business facing. Measures of success “First time fix” rate >80% Student and staff satisfaction in relation to IT services is high. Increase in consistent and competent use of IT systems and services enables staff and students to be more effective in their work and learning IT Strategy Resources This strategy articulates an ambitious programme for change. A full restructure of the IT organisation within Information and Library Services has taken place which has created a staffing model that is in line with (affordable) best practice, referencing organisational models from peers around the country and the Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA Foundation). In existing resource terms the IT strategy assumes: A central IT service with motivated staff that possess relevant skills, capabilities and competencies. An acceptance that the effective execution of the IT strategy is a shared responsibility, and relevant staffing resources can be mobilised within Faculties, Schools and Offices to facilitate University wide initiatives. An assessment of the positioning of some existing IT orientated resources is undertaken to ensure value for money and economies of scale can be achieved; for example, a move to desktop virtualisation would require devolved PC equipment budgets to be repositioned. Over a period of five years, it is impossible to precisely provide cost estimates for the various programmes and projects articulated within the strategy. However, it is clear that additional annual resources will be required which are outlined at high level below. Infrastructure (capital) £1M pa Well managed infrastructure replacement is a rolling requirement, which, as we look to improve resilience, distribution, bandwidth, storage and capacity will require significant investment. The infrastructure budget will enable the institution to modernise over the next five years and create an environment which meets the underpinning computing needs of the IT strategy and therefore the Strategic Plan. By taking a holistic and planned approach to infrastructure lifecycle management we will avoid a “peak and trough” approach to funding and ensure that the university has a known level of budget to deliver the level of service required through the planning period and into the future. The budget will be placed under the control of the IT Strategy Steering Group (via VCG). Page 14 Projects (revenue) £500K - £750K pa The level of change proposed within this IT Strategy will require additional revenue budget, which will provide; Additional specialist staff to supplement permanent IT employees using medium term contract staff working across projects rather than high cost agency resources. Knowledge transfer, training and staff development from specialists to ensure projects are successfully transferred to business as usual. Software licences and tools, where required. Consultancy and professional services, particularly from suppliers during the implementation of particular products. The budget would be placed under the control of the IT Strategy Steering Group (via VCG). Academic Rolling Programme (revenue) £350K - £600 pa Budgets to provide the following student facing facilities will be integrated to provide a known resource level which facilitates medium to long term planning; Student PCs and other end point device replacement on a (usually) four year cycle. Student printing, scanning, photocopying and other output/presentation technology. Learning space technology to a baseline standard; covering increased coverage and maintenance but not step change enhancement, which would require additional funding. Other student facing services which require regular replacement. University of Greenwich Indicative Programme 2012/13 Please note that this programme is very high level and is likely to change over time. Small to medium sized projects and areas of activity are not included. 2013/14 2014/15 Resources Stockwell Street 1- Teaching and Learning 2015/16 2016/17 Replacement Library Management System Academic resource discovery Support for enhanced e-learning 3 - Communities and 2 - Research Experience and Enterprise Learning space technology to baseline level Research specific computing requirements Research administration improvements Online collaborative tools Research repository improvements Website redevelopment Development of mobile applications and services Office automation, collaboration and communities Social networking support Portal and intranet redevelopment 4 - Enterprise Solutions Business Intelligence Smart card, access control and cashless processing Relationship management (Recruitment and Admissions) 5 - Infrastructure Business process continuous improvement VOIP telephony Creating a mobile workforce – universal communications Single desktop image (Windows 7) 6 - Service, Support and Change BYOD (Bring your own device) Cloud infrastructure Network and server infrastructure capital improvement Continuous improvement over the lifetime of the strategy to create an excellent support environment with 80% + first time fix rate and high satisfaction 7 - Governance, Organisational improvements to ensure the strategy is in line with the strategic requirements of the institution. Significant improvement in security, DR and process compliance and security
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