IT services newsletter #10

IT Services Student Survey 2009
During May, The Oxford Research Agency (TORA) conducted an online survey sent to a random selection of 1,000 students. It was designed to cover a number of performance indicators to be used as the basis for tracking research - this survey providing a baseline. The same survey has been employed for a few years at another University enabling comparator analysis. The full survey will shortly be made available on the IT Services website for comments and feedback. I’d like to thank the students who responded to the survey (14%) for providing us with valuable and constructive feedback. Some key conclusions from those who responded to the survey are:

• Usage of University IT facilities is high (9 in 10 students use PC clusters at least occasionally and 8 in 10 claim general use).
• 97% of students use their University email accounts, with 70% on a daily basis
  Usage is more frequent among younger students (aged 25 and under), and males more frequently than females.
• Four in five are satisfied with opening hours and availability of facilities. However, in three of the eight rated aspects our students are significantly less satisfied than students at comparator University (opening hours, reliability of systems and prepay printing service).
• A quarter of students are concerned about reliability of systems.
• Key improvements identified were increasing the number of PCs, increasing the number of printers, improving the quality of computer rooms, and increasing silent study spaces.
  Three quarters of students agree that IT resources and services are good enough for their needs and less than one in ten disagree.

We intend to review the conclusions, establish a series of recommendations, and publish those on the IT Services website in a format which is responsive to student feedback i.e. “you told us this…….we did that”. Hopefully we can have all that in place for the start of next academic session.

Change Management Project – Inspirational Leadership Course
A number of staff in the IT Services team have received a personal invitation to attend two, two-day events which will be led by Robina Chatham. Robina has already been introduced to those of us that are members of the LSS Board as she has conducted two events this year in January and in June. Line managers have already been asked to discuss within their teams and make nominations for this. There will be a report on the events in future newsletters. The first two day event on June 23 and 24th has the following outline agenda.

Political & influencing skills
Organisational politics – putting organisational politics into context; what is it and why we need to be good at it. The importance of trust and collaborative behaviour in achieving long term political success
Personality types – understanding your own personality type and how it differs from that of others. Valuing and appreciating difference and how to communicate with and be sensitive to the needs of others
Influencing styles – learning how to tailor your communication to the receiver using their preferred “language”. How to engage and build rapport with your audience
Recognising type in others – practical experience in “reading” other people. How to identify their personality type through a short everyday discussion

Reputations & relationships 360°
Leadership and motivation – the characteristic leadership strengths and potential weaknesses of each of the types; how to maximise your own potential, develop your own unique leadership style and motivate the different types
Understanding your customers – what is really important to them, how they measure and judge you and what you would need to do in order to truly delight them
Stereotypes and reputation – why first impressions are so important, how this affects our reputation and what we can do to influence it for the better
Team dynamics – understanding team dynamics, the potential synergies and clashes within a team and how to get people with dissimilar thinking styles to work together positively and constructively.

Change Management Project – IT Strategy Framework Document
A third draft on renewing the IT strategy was circulated and discussed at last week’s IT Board meeting. As you know, the University in now in the process of developing its new corporate plan. There remains an open invitation to provide your feedback on this process and the latest version of the strategy which is available on the shared drive. The next circulation date is July 2nd for presentation to the University’s Information Strategy Committee on July 9th.

Review meetings with School s and Corporate Services
The review meetings have been completed and the feedback has been documented in the updated trackers. I have also arranged a follow up meeting with all of the School Administrators on June 19th, and I had the opportunity to meet the six new student sabatticals last Thursday. This type of ongoing communication is going to be part of the emerging “account management” activity and has served a useful purpose in raising the profile of IT Services and providing an opportunity to present the many positive aspects of our service.

Announcing a new Finance Business Support System
There are a number of us who have been involved in different ways with the procurement phase of this project. Last week, the Project Board met to receive the final recommendations and analysis of the project team, and a decision was taken on the preferred bidder, subject to final contract negotiations. This procurement process has been extremely comprehensive and has fully tested the potential market, resulting in COA as the successful partner. I would like to thank all those colleagues that have given their time to making this a fully-informed decision especially Connie Jackson, Peter Jones, Philip Briggs, Geoff Bell, Mark Jones and in particular our project manager for this phase Russell Allen.

Celebrating Silver Anniversaries, Babies and Marriages
For those who may not be aware (and I may not be thanked for this!) Congratulations to all those who attended the celebration event. And while we are celebrating, congratulations to our colleague on becoming a grandma (if you need to know the weight and time of birth then you know who to ask!), and many congratulations to colleagues on the nuptuals this weekend – best wishes to you both.

Any Other Business
As usual, this newsletter can only provide a limited and personal selection in terms of the many changes taking place within the service. Here are just a few more examples:

• There have been over 280 purchases of Microsoft Office on the “Ultimate Steal” promotion – thanks to Sara for setting this up and promoting it to our students.
• Room 01.57 in JBP Building is now available and bookable in Meeting Maker as a resource. A number of people now have proxy access to see bookings – if anyone else would like access please let me know.
• The last paper payslips have been issued as we move to on-line services.
• A business process review has been initiated for the complex enrolment and registration of new students onto the IT and Library services.
• We are in the process of reviewing our expenditure over the next two years and seeking ways to reduce operating costs. A group of us are investigating alternative options.
• Roger Goodair and John Fairhall are leading on a market testing process for the corporate mobile phone contract. This will take place over the Summer and could include provision for students as a potential option.
• It has been agreed to invest in replacement new PCs at the front of GTA lecture theatres that currently have PC equipment which is reaching end of life. This will be happening over the Summer co-incident with GTA refurbishments that were highlighted in the last newsletter.