Wolverhampton weekly newsletter #9

We started the week with the fortnightly "scrum" and that started the week rolling with all things "Print Project" related.  This came about as a result of updates about the Project Board later that day.  At the end of the week there was confirmation that the sponsor had given the final go ahead.  Communications should be rolling today ahead of Monday's planned installations across the Walsall campus.

We also had a major upgrade to the Apps Anywhere service this week, which involved a planned service interruption. This turned out to be quite a lot shorted than anticipated.  It appears to have gone to plan.

I had an audio-conference with Box this week and there is now a meeting in mid-January at Wolverhampton to discuss next steps. I am wondering if this is potentially one of several platforms that might assist with "non-VLE use of Canvas".  It also came up in discussions at the end of the week on Digital Landscape.

I have had four "Digital Lens" sessions this week with the Dean of Students, Digital marketing, Dean of COLT and also the new Head of Computer Science and Maths). I also met with the VC and asked if he would so some homework for me - I've asked him to carry the crib sheet around with him and jot down any relevant areas from his perspective.  This could be the basis of future and ongoing discussions - not a one off exercise - and will feed into the Digital Advisory Boards process which is now getting established for end January.

I finally made it up to the Science Park on Monday this week and have a number of photos and observations. I will do the same thing that I did for the two Server Room visits and put a few slides together.  With over 100 University staff as well as a thriving set of small and medium sized businesses (many technology focused) this is an interesting set of customers and requirements.

There was a really useful conversation about student interns/apprentices and the organisational learning her team has gone through with recruitment and coaching of students.  I am personally very much in favour of students being employed alongside staff teams which can have positive outcomes for everyone involved if well managed.

Finally, I spent a couple of hours giving feedback on the draft business case for Data Management. We had a really positive and constructive session (and the canteen noodles weren't bad) and I was also able to update him on the early output relating to Digital Strategy.

 

The Slater's evening was good fun and there are some excellent santa selfies as proof!  Hopefully everyone is in their Christmas Jumpers today.

Wolverhampton weekly newsletter #8

At the start of the week I spent time developing the first draft of the Digital Strategy presentation.  Very much a preliminary draft and work in progress and is expected to provide the basis for further iterations and improvements in both content and presentation.  There are a number of supporting documents and collateral which I have used which will be made available as part of this work package.

I attended the second of two research focus groups.  During the session I made a couple of contributions about looking forward into future digital research requirements, and also protecting existing research assets.  I provided team with a summary of the digital gaps, opportunities, threats and capabilities as I perceived them after the meeting.  I think that this model can work quite well but I am going to have to work harder to get people to use this model during the next period of consultation.  Will need to think about how to really engage the digital research agenda if this is going to be a priority (which I feel it should be).

In my catch up meeting with the technical services team, we discussed a number of pieces of work that will be progressing as a matter of priority.  I was pleased that there had been consultation within his team and names had been allocated – these activities are not big enough to warrant any project overhead, but I am keen that they progress and are monitored pro-actively.

I had useful separate catch ups to keep in touch about VLE related and exit handover activity.  I have picked up a request to draft a paper about the non-teaching VLE plan as we migrate from the WOLF system and will pick that up next week.

One thing that I haven’t done well is keep the contract Project Managers informed about what I am doing generally, and that is a gap as they are potentially a little out of the day-to-day loop and potentially with much to offer.  I am going to try and get us all together and provide a briefing and chance to exchange thoughts.

My final meeting of the week was about asset management There are new posts being advertised on the internal University vacancy pages relating to this work.  This is part of a package of dozen or so posts which were mentioned and I wonder whether it might be useful to alert the DAS team to the customer facing roles already recruited, the roles that are actively in progress and those that will follow shortly.  It's another good news story for DAS.

Wolverhampton weekly newsletter #7

There have been a number of things going on this week.  The “moles” have been hard at it again this week and I have been updating the tracker.  

I had a very useful follow-up with the Marketing Team in which they shared their strategy on web, social and paper-based marketing and recruitment  activity. They are working collaboratively across the Faculties and it was positive to hear about the consistent approach they have developed using the Content Management System (T4) and the progress which has been made on social media presence (top 10 in UK higher Education currently).  A clear strategy of quality over quantity paying off.  We also had a useful discussion about course information and how that is being interfaced from SITS into T4 currently and the linkage that has been picked up with our in-house system (WOLF).  This team's timescales may need to be factored in due to timelines for paper-based prospectus and course related information.  They were constructively critical about a couple of activities which would make life easier for them and have got "stuck".  I will attempt to unblock for my next meeting with them to follow up in two weeks.

There were some really positive meetings this week, including the DAS Leadership Team and the DAS Digital Campus Board.  I  did a little research and provided links to Penn State who are a little ahead of us, but also in the midst of a major Canvas migration.  We are in good company with Canvas.  I also made contact with UWL ref Sharepoint and they are willing to assist us setting up a call next week and also interested in our Canvas experiences.

I completed a Powerpoint report from last week's Data Centre tour.  I took some time to feedback a summary to Ian for the Directorate's Risk Register.  There were some other potential risks that have cropped up which were recorded in the "current state analysis" report so I have also taken the opportunity to raise those as well.

I have kept an eye on the information audit work and tender.  On Thursday, I provided responses to a number of questions which have been raised by interested suppliers.  There was also a request to identify top University suppliers over the last three years.  I now have the analysis and the total investment is significant.  My original objective was seeking out key existing partners to bring together to seek insight into Digital Strategy external to Wolverhampton.  In discussing, I am now also adding in key sector suppliers who we don't currently do business with.

Some really good intra-team discussions taking place this week.  For example putting together some plans for a series of "Tech Talks" starting in the New Year.  The focus is on sharing knowledge, but its not going to be exclusive in any way, and there was a suggestion that there may be interest from colleagues outside of DAS.  There is also consideration being given to Continual Service Improvement ahead of the new Enquiry Management System and that is very encouraging.

Final session of the week was to discuss the Enquiry Management implementation project once we get beyond the standstill period.  It will require effective Project Management, clarity over the scope (incident-focus).   One of the critical success factors will be the technical input from the supplier/integrator with configuring the system.  We are going to set up a conference call with a reference site so that colleagues can explore some of the project-related issues and timescales.