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February 9, 2001
UW Oshkosh Working Group on Classroom Scheduling/Computer Labs
c/o Assistant Vice Chancellor John Berens
University of Wisconsin Oshkosh
800 Algoma Blvd
Oshkosh, WI 54901-8650
Re: Report of Findings and Recommendations
Thank you for the opportunity to participate in the review of campus computer laboratories at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh (UWO). The entire process has been both enlightening and intriguing for me as well as my associates. The UWO campus enjoys many advanced capabilities and a current atmosphere of resolve toward computer laboratory solutions that benefit all campus users. This is an enviable position and one that is due primarily to a willingness to work together for which UWO is to be commended.
The UWO campus is very fortunate in one respect; you have reached a crisis point toward which we are all rushing, yet you seem to have risen to the occasion in pursuit of a common solution rather than destroying progress made in favor of individual goals. This tells me a great deal about the UWO campus even before we begin to look at specific issues. There may or may not be complete consensus, there may or may not be a single solution, and there almost certainly is not a method of proceeding without some give and take between and among all parties. However, you recognize these factors and wish to proceed with a solution, or set of solutions, that result in the best possible campus environment for students, faculty and staff at UWO.
We respectfully submit the attached report for your consideration. If you desire additional meetings or discussions to clarify or expand upon points within the report, we are available at your convenience. Thank you again for the opportunity to participate in this process.
Sincerely,
Joseph N. Douglas, Jr.
Report of Review Findings and Recommendations, February 1, 2001
Respectfully submitted by Joe Douglas, Paul Gunderson, Brett Besag
Accompanying Spreadsheets:
The materials you provided combined with the opportunity to meet with UWO campus leaders and user groups were most helpful in gaining insight into the issues surrounding the computer laboratories at UWO. It appears the primary concerns are:
We will refer to the materials you provided as needed and attempt to distill our comments into these three categories. Examples of alternative approaches or additional services will be provided as appropriate. In general, we find that UWO has taken many of the correct, yet difficult, first steps toward solution of these problems.
Setting the Stage
Teaching, learning, research and public service represent the mission, goals and primary reasons for our existence as University of Wisconsin entities. As public institutions we all face the reality of funding limitations, insufficient staff, increasing demand for services and the constant need to do more with less aand do a better job than we have in the past.
As resources remain constant, or diminish, and demand increases we must find ways to work together and become more efficient. One heavily utilized resource that should not be difficult to achieve success with respect to cooperation and efficiency is technology. The selection, acquisition and application of the wide variety of technologies employed on a university campus represents an excellent area for institutional advancement and substantial cost savings. Technology is expensive to acquire, expensive to support and typically represents a significant portion of the institution's operating budget. Cost considerations alone should be sufficient to cause the institution to standardize and economize wherever and whenever possible.
Cost considerations aside, technology has achieved the position of integral to the strategic process of the university in its daily operations as well as its planning for the future. It would be foolhardy at best to consider any course of action, even one limited to the curricular sphere of the institution, without including from the outset input from the professionals on campus most familiar with the overall technology goals, objectives and environment of the campus. Very little can be done today without the use of or reliance upon technology. Incorporating technology considerations in all strategic and operational discussions and decision making is essential to assuring a successful outcome of ongoing and future operations.
Given the non-trivial nature of technology expenditures and the strategic import of technology in decisions and planning, it is essential that the institution exercise a reasonable measure of control regarding the types and quantities of technologies employed on the campus. Achieving the goals of the university may actually be hindered significantly through less than optimal or inappropriate selections and applications of technologies. The university must assure long term progress and success of its programs by setting a reasonable direction and refusing technologies that do not fit effectively within that plan. This will require continued support from the highest levels and a continuation of the cooperative approach UWO has thus far applied to the issues surrounding the campus computer labs.
Sometimes we just have to say no to some types of technology. The potential for increasing complexity of the infrastructure, the support resources required and the cost of operation must be carefully considered before a new technology is introduced to the campus.
A specific piece of technology (i.e. software, hardware, communication vehicle or tool of some sort) will not turn a bad teacher into a good teacher. Technology will not turn a bad researcher into a good researcher; nor will it turn a bad student into a good student; nor will technology provide any useful public service in and of itself. Technology cannot be good or bad; one may not ascribe moral qualities to inanimate objects or tools. Technology can work well or not so well depending upon the circumstances of application and the qualifications of the user.
Technology can and does enable a good teacher and result in a better transfer of knowledge to the student. Technology can and does enable a good researcher and facilitate greater depth of study or better definition of experimental results. Technology can and does allow us to create an environment for learning that is conducive to better student performance. Technology can and does provide a basis for expanding the university into the community and establishing meaningful collaborative efforts in a wide variety of disciplines. However, the best technology available cannot provide an effective solution without proper planning and installation with respect to the existing campus environment.
Fixation on, and lengthy argument or debate regarding, one particular piece of technology as opposed to another beyond a reasonable amount of time and detail is typically wasted effort in our opinion. Arguments and/or discussions easily escalate to positions of religious or political import as participants entrench and promote their favorite technology. Unless the particular technology is truly unique (which is a rare occurrence indeed), there are multiple alternatives capable of leading to the same results. Convenience, ease of use, degree of applicability, scalability, interoperability, adherence to standards, best practices, stability, quality of results and cost are among the typical variables one must consider when selecting a technology to apply. Certainly, there is ample room for give and take with such a laundry list of variables impacting selection.
All technologies have good and bad features. All technologies have situations in which they perform extremely well and extremely poorly. Proper planning and implementation is crucial to successful application of any technology. All technologies are tools that, when placed in the hands of a qualified user can be applied to the task for which they are intended to produce an enhanced outcome. The trick is to choose the optimal cross section of technologies to satisfy the needs of the UWO campus, maximize utility and usability, and minimize change or conflict. Sounds simple, but it isn't.
Many technologies are compatible in a shared environment; many are simply not compatible and no degree of adjustment will cause them to become compatible in any shared environment. Most technologies fall somewhere in between the extremes of all or nothing in a shared environment.
There are academic disciplines that must regularly assess the needs of industry and the technologies utilized by the industries in which their graduates will ultimately be employed. Targeting certain technologies to enhance the applicability of the students' educational experience is absolutely a good thing to do. When these targeted technologies fit well into the campus technology environment things go well and support is readily available. If the targeted technology does not fit well into the campus technology environment, special accommodations are necessary if the graduates of UWO are to enter the market well prepared. One method of accommodating special needs is the use of discipline specific labs.
There is a clear distinction between general access and discipline specific use of technologies. We say this knowing full well that the clear distinction varies widely from campus to campus and also varies somewhat from school to school within a campus. Oshkosh has already begun the process of defining the distinction with respect to campus lab technologies. Although somewhat controversial and even a bit painful, the work done to date is very useful and represents an excellent start.
General Access Computer Labs
General access labs work best and cost the least to support when the environment is consistent, the equipment is compatible and the individual workstations can be readily replicated hundreds of times quickly. The ideal situation is to have all software and all hardware exactly the same in all general access labs on the campus.
Given the realities of fiscal funding, staff size, equipment failure, upgrades, new releases and innovative technologies it is seldom possible to achieve the ideal situation. Typically, labs have the equipment refreshed every 3 to 4 years and software added or upgraded annually. The amount of time actually required to physically replace all equipment in campus labs with the staff available on a campus the size of UWO often exceeds the time available between semester breaks for such work. The cycle of replacing about one third of the equipment in general access labs each year tends to fit within the parameters of time and staff availability reasonably well.
Typically, one has at least three different configurations of hardware (due primarily to the limitations cited above and the rapid rate of change of hardware these days) and it is essential that the lab configurations be as compatible as possible and operate using a compatible set of software. Configuration compatibility will assure reasonable responsiveness for equipment repairs and/or configuration rebuilds. Compatible software suites will assure ease of use for students moving from lab to lab across campus and facilitate assistance to users from the campus help desk. To some, these concerns appear to limit the utility of the general access labs. Actually, this appears to be one of the underlying concerns in many of the comments we heard from faculty and staff.
In reality, a coordinated, compatible and well managed general access lab program serves the students and faculty of UWO by providing the base of services upon which many new innovative services may be constructed. Commonality of look and feel eliminates an unnecessary stress factor in the teaching and learning process putting students and faculty both at greater ease. We have seen first hand the development and growth of very successful efforts centered around a solid general access lab program. For examples of successful uses involving a lab program, please refer to Appendix A .
Innovative options are not always readily apparent at the outset, but are easily built upon a solid foundation like a well managed lab program. At UWO you have completed most of the difficult work required to establish an effective general access computer lab program.
Your campus working groups and the results of activity last Spring and Summer appear to have determined a software base for general access computer labs that is meeting the needs of most people at UWO. We were impressed with the cooperation, the efforts and the results. The criteria established to review potential general computer access lab software is appropriate, and the appeal process appears to be working and serving the common interests of the campus. The campus should do an annual review of the general computer access lab software array. This review should provide the opportunity for departments to propose new lab software and also recommend software that can be removed. This process should be completed before the end of the spring semester, so that the baseline software array in the general computer access labs for the next academic year can be set. We believe regular reviews and timely refinements where needed will maximize the usefulness of the general access computer labs.
We do understand that you were unable to satisfy every single request and perceived need with the current approach. However, the criteria you used should result in an environment in the labs that meets the vast majority of needs while assuring a supportable infrastructure and high level of service.
Unsatisfied needs in the general access computer labs should be looked at in two possible categories; potential extensions of the labs, or suitable for discipline specific use only.
We are aware of your staff investigating and using some of the enabling technologies which potentially leverage campus resources in support of labs. We suggest continual review of push technologies, pull technologies, thin client, web delivery and client/server technologies on the UWO campus, so that the best and most appropriate tools are utilized. We are also aware of your staff collaborating with others in the UW system to use their knowledge and expertise in reviewing these technologies. We encourage you to continue to leverage the wealth of information, experience and assistance available throughout the UW System.
We were particularly intrigued by the "Independent Lab" concept recently implemented in one of your general computer access labs. This unique approach to satisfying special needs could be the key to solving those last minute, unexpected faculty requirements. Once the lab environment is set each spring for the coming academic year, it is a non-trivial task to make last minute adjustments; and it is often very expensive to do so in terms of both monetary outlay and service disruption. The independent lab concept promises the ability to immediately support the unexpected with minimal inconvenience and maximum service given that we are unable to disrupt the set environment. We believe this concept should be examined closely over the next few semesters as an innovative method for satisfying special needs of both faculty and students. It could also promise a new way of reviewing software compatibility before incorporating it into the campus environment.
As an example of potential extensions to the general access computer labs, consider the possibility of a layered approach to generic services. It is possible to create a layer on top of the generic environment containing certain specific hardware and software components that enhance the lab for a major subset of the student population. This has worked successfully in such schools as art, business, engineering and medicine as well as for honors programs and in certain residence halls.
The layered approach may prove useful on the UWO campus to reduce the large number of discipline specific labs; or, at least to provide for certain of the discipline specific needs without the expense of an additional lab.
Layered labs
Over the years we have had some success with a layered approach to general access labs (see Appendix B) in various settings. Success that indicates this approach may evolve into a workable solution with continued experience and refinement. We typically begin with a general access lab that has a history of traffic patterns that indicate the lab is heavily, but not exclusively, utilized by students from a particular program or school. The lab already has a standard set of software and hardware that satisfies the generic needs of students, but does not have facilities specifically for the special subset of students.
In a cooperative project, IT staff and faculty from the discipline represented in the special subset of students identify specific hardware and software that provides high level functionality and satisfies certain special requirements for the subset of students, yet works well in the standard lab environment. This requires a bit of trial and error as well as a fair amount of time in the planning and testing, but results in a set of tools that can be supported and satisfies the special needs. The faculty, or the school, are typically in a much better (if not unique) position to solicit donations or discounts from vendors of the specialized hardware and software. The faculty, or school, acquire the special hardware and software and commit to the cost of maintaining those products on an ongoing basis. The IT staff installs and maintains the special products as part of the lab's regular support and maintenance activity.
The resulting labs have higher level capabilities, including things like specialized printing and plotting equipment, and selected software modules available at no other location on campus. The labs are sufficiently advanced to accommodate the special needs of the target student subset yet continue to serve the needs of the general student body as before. We recommend UWO investigate this approach as a possible option for reducing the number of discipline specific labs and enhancing the functionality of selected general access labs.
Discipline Specific Computer Laboratories
Discipline specific labs have many more degrees of freedom than general access labs. The typical discipline specific lab need not contain any hardware or software not specifically required to support the learning or research in that discipline. The lab need not be functional at all times, in fact, some discipline specific labs are designed to allow the student to break the systems and/or stretch the limits of the software and hardware used. Most discipline specific labs utilize software in a teaching environment specially designed for that discipline (i.e. mathematics, communications, business, languages, etc).
Frequently, the software (and often the hardware) in a discipline specific lab is non-generic, very new on the market, or perhaps created to accompany a textbook. Many times these products do not fit well into a "standard" environment that is shared by many other products. This incompatibility is what makes it so difficult to incorporate certain discipline specific software and hardware products into the general access labs. Often the discipline specific software or hardware does integrate reasonably well into the "standard" environment, but the use of the product must be restricted because of licensing agreements or because accidental misuse of the product could adversely impact the environment.
However, discipline specific labs are often necessary and do serve a much-needed purpose. Unfortunately, historically discipline specific labs tend to have developed with grant funding or other one-time monies and have no sustainable funding base. Discipline specific labs tend to be filled with older equipment and software; and tend to be unsupported or supported as an afterthought or part time effort taking valuable time away from faculty and staff teaching and research loads. One of the critical decisions facing UWO is the determination of just how many discipline specific labs the campus can afford to build and maintain at an acceptable level of service for student and faculty use.
Justification for the creation of a discipline specific lab should be relatively difficult and meet stringent criteria. Since the Deans are the primary responsible parties for creating and supporting discipline specific labs, we believe the Deans should establish the criteria for justifying these labs. The strategic nature of certain disciplines, the start-up and maintenance expenses, the ongoing support, the need to fit into the campus technology environment are among the things to be considered before one builds or continues to support a discipline specific lab. Perhaps the existing Working Group could draft an initial criteria list with leadership from the Deans.
These statements are not intended to limit the abilities of the faculty to provide needed services, rather to assure that the need justifies the expense. If it is worth doing, it is worth doing right and certainly worth sustaining the effort. We recommend that UWO create an environment wherein discipline specific labs are provided the funding necessary to sustain them at a level of service and utility that will assure quality resources for the students and faculty users. This will, no doubt, require a combination of school or college and central funding and support. Half measures will continue to produce low yields.
Carefully reviewing and justifying the need for and location of discipline specific labs at UWO will result in a smaller number of labs toward which existing expenditures may be directed. This is based on the assumption that the existing number of labs is too high and the resources provided by individual schools and colleges, combined with some resource contribution from the central administration, would be much better used in a more concentrated fashion. Experience indicates this is a very good assumption and that the concentration of resources to provide a higher level of service will improve the instructional utility of the discipline specific labs.
The survey you recently conducted includes responses describing 32 separate discipline specific labs. We might argue that five or ten percent of those responses describe collections of hardware and software that don't really qualify as labs. However, they are providing some level of needed service for one or more academic disciplines or they wouldn't exist. Perhaps the needed service could easily be replaced, perhaps not. You should conduct a detailed review of each lab to determine real needs and the effectiveness of each lab in meeting those needs.
From another perspective, the 32 discipline labs reported contain a total of 363 computers and 77 printers. The reported staff committed to maintaining the 32 labs is a total of 4.15 FTE. On first inspection, it is apparent that the actual level of effort and accompanying cost to the university was not accurately reported since 4.15 FTE is a remarkably low number of staff members to support 32 labs and such a high number of computers and printers. Alternatively, the numbers may reflect the true situation in which case the labs should be in a state of relative disrepair, with very old technology and of questionable use to students and faculty.
We suspect the truth is somewhere in between but leaning toward the unsupported, aging and questionable use end of the scale. The detailed survey data regarding computer type and age indicates this a reasonable conclusion. It is not uncommon to find discipline specific labs in a relatively sorry state. The primary reason for such condition is, of course, lack of adequate funding to maintain current technology and concomitant lack of sufficient staff resources to provide a high quality service. Individual disciplines, departments, schools and colleges typically find themselves financially stressed and higher priorities take precedence over upgrades and technical support. Inappropriate personnel (i.e. faculty members) are pressed into service in support of labs and technology, which is a questionable use of valuable teaching and research time. The future does not appear to come with a discipline specific solution for this problem and the time does appear to be right to explore alternative solutions.
We did note that the survey results indicate requests for an additional eight discipline specific labs in the College of Letters and Sciences with an additional 3.3 FTE for support. It is unlikely that this represents sufficient support staff given the understaffed position currently existing and careful consideration must be given to these requests. At this time, it does not seem wise to perpetuate a model that will only exacerbate the problems of lab aging and questionable utility in the college.
It is difficult to imagine the future of discipline specific computer labs being productive and useful to students and faculty unless one assumes an improved atmosphere of cooperation and collaboration between and among central IT staff and distributed unit IT staff. Combining knowledge, resources and expertise to maximize the return on IT investment for the campus is essential in the technology rich world of today. All of the old barriers to collaboration simply must be removed. UWO senior administration must firmly guide the campus in a new spirit of cooperation or face the prospect of continued rising costs and mediocre or diminishing service levels.
Classrooms with Media and Computers
It is clear that several of the labs reported on your survey are actually teaching spaces outfitted with computers and other media as needed to conduct regular class meetings in specific disciplines. Such rooms are very necessary in some instances and should be carefully maintained and scheduled to maximize the use of the facility and the return on investment. Technology is expensive. Creating and maintaining computer classrooms is very expensive and should be done where and when the expense is adequately justified in support of the mission of the university. Sharing such facilities between and among departments, schools and colleges should be strongly encouraged and even required if the technology is sufficiently generic to apply to multiple disciplines.
A smaller number of general access computer classrooms maintained in excellent condition with current technology and adequate support staff is a wise investment for the university and will provide a higher level and quality of service to the students and faculty. We believe investing in general access computer classrooms, with an accompanying program for managing and utilizing the spaces, will lead to a sharp decline in requests for discipline specific labs. Many of the perceived needs for resources and services in discipline specific labs may be replaced by the existence of general access computer classrooms. A smaller number of spaces may introduce a certain amount of inconvenience (i.e. it may not be next door or even in your building), but the increased quality and utility should more than compensate for any perceived lack of convenience.
Scheduling and use of computer classrooms must adhere to certain criteria to assure maximized results. These criteria will undoubtedly impact the process for determining the number of computer classrooms required at UWO. We offer the following as examples of criteria. No doubt, UWO has existing criteria for scheduling the rooms now in existence, but perhaps these will help if refinements are needed.
Staff impact
Assuming we all agree that supporting computer labs and troubleshooting technical problems is a waste of valuable faculty time, the impact on technical support staff may be viewed from different perspectives. The institution must determine the best approach for its employees' long-term development and job satisfaction. Again, sounds simple, but it's not.
In general, technical support staff have two options in the university setting; a position in the central IT organization or a position in a department not affiliated with the central IT organization.
Given the realities of fiscal funding, position descriptions, salary equity and breadth of responsibility, when compared to others in the UW System, the technical support staff member who takes a position in an academic department may well find themselves in a dead end job. The work is interesting and there may be some opportunity for advancement and professional development. However, there is little, if any, career path in the IT profession in such an isolated setting and there is little hope of substantial advancement unless the individual is willing to leave the university or move into the central organization. It is true that individuals can and do move between and among schools and departments typically in pursuit of salary gains, but this does not normally represent career advancement in the profession.
There are advantages to working in a single department or a single school. The clientele is finite and reasonably well known. The technology is typically limited to a subset of those technologies employed across campus. Many of the infrastructure components are provided and the individual need only be concerned with local needs. The projects and priorities are usually well defined and receive the cooperation of faculty and students in the department or school. It is a reasonably good environment to work in as the technical support person receives a certain amount of respect from others in the area and is somewhat free to solve problems without the burden of satisfying an overly large or diverse constituency. We have all worked in such environments and appreciate the good and the bad aspects of such an assignment.
The disadvantages, aside from career growth, tend to focus around inadequate funding, outdated technologies, potential incompatibilities with campus standards and the social responsibility one has to the campus when one joins the networked environment. The first two items we all deal with, some more successfully than others. The last two items are linked and tend to cause the most trouble in any organization as complex as a university.
We no longer live in a world where technology exists as an isolated island. Most of us, the vast majority, utilize campus networking infrastructure and the internet in our daily activities. The moment you connect your desktop computer to a local area network, or to the campus network, or access the internet, you enter the social environment of technology in much the same way you enter the social environment of travel when your car exits the driveway at home and enters the public streets. You are no longer free to do as you please because your actions affect every other person in the environment. You must adhere to certain "rules of the road" or be denied the privilege of entering the environment altogether.
Most frequently, the clashes we see over technology tend to occur in the border between isolated use and the public world of technology. Individuals responsible for a specific function, department or school may develop an excellent technology solution to satisfy the needs within that area. However, when an attempt is made to migrate that solution from the relatively isolated state to the more public environment, the solution fails to comply with the standards and rules, or the environment rejects the solution as inadequate to scale properly and/or meet the needs of the general user.
Regardless of reason, the clash that ensues may be avoided or at least mitigated substantially by understanding that change is required. The specific technology solution may need to be abandoned in favor of a similar but more compatible solution to permit all users access to needed services or collaborative activities. The social environment may need to change and absorb a modification to the standards to permit all users access to innovative tools and new services.
Technical support staff in department, school or college assignments need to be engaged in ongoing discussions and planning sessions with the central IT staff. Central IT staff need to make a concerted effort to solicit input from unit support staff and involve them in discussions and planning efforts. We believe this happens successfully at UWO. We also believe this never happens well enough and constant vigilance on the part of all those involved is required to assure success. We cannot stress strongly enough the requirement to build trust and mutual respect between and among the central and distributed technical support staff.
How many technical support staff do you need? Where and by whom should they be employed? Is it wise to perpetuate the silo effect and perceived differences between groups of employees or should UWO take a look at some adaptation of matrix management concepts as a method to bring technical staff together and create career pathways and professional development opportunities? Can student labor be utilized effectively in the solution of technical support problems?
Let's take the easy questions first. The final number of labs, computers and classrooms will substantially determine the number and types of support staff you will need. Of paramount importance is the requirement that you recognize the real need and staff accordingly. It is clear that the campus is understaffed now. It is highly probable that the campus can effect substantial improvements in the way in which existing staff are deployed in the support of technology. Collaborating on the future and the support of the future for technology at UWO will allow you to determine the correct number and deployment strategies to make the campus successful.
Another recommendation is to explore more fully the introduction of technology based labor saving solutions in all labs and classrooms. Although technology is expensive, people are typically more expensive and every effort should be made to leverage the existing technology environment to minimize the number of technical support staff required. Another balancing act to be sure, but one that UWO administration must recognize as critical to assuring the funding spent in support of technology on campus maximizes the return on investment.
For example, there is a growing trend in the technology field to move away from local area networking in a venue smaller than the entire campus. The elimination of artificial boundaries caused by multiple local area network protocols and the interfaces required to overcome the inherent incompatibilities can represent a significant savings to the typical campus. Web based solutions implemented as campus wide replacements for local area networking can simplify support and lower accompanying costs. This does not mean we can look forward to a reduction in current technology staff; rather, we may need less of an increase and new ways of deploying staff to provide quality services to the campus user community. As we see parochial solutions give way to global solutions we may actually open the doors for professional growth and create new career pathways for many technical staff.
Student labor, when properly trained and empowered, can have a tremendous impact on the campus at a substantially reduced cost when compared to permanent support staff. It is our experience that fully one third of the permanent staff time can be recovered for use on high priority campus projects by carefully utilizing student labor. This is a remarkable increase in campus resource and provides the student labor force with opportunities to learn lessons outside the classroom that are invaluable to them in professional life. We strongly recommend that UWO explore a structured development program to create and sustain a student technology labor force on campus. The Student Technology Services (STS) program at the UWM campus is a nationally recognized program and is available to assist UWO at virtually no cost because of the UWSA funding provided each year. We would be happy to explore this option further at your convenience.
The tough questions are the ones that deal with organizational alignment, supervision and work assignments. It is possible to implement an effective technical staff development, supervision and campus support program using many of the techniques borrowed from matrix management concepts. We attempt to utilize this model wherever possible as it lends itself well to projects and flexibility in approach.
Many of the matrix management concepts we have today grew out of the NASA space program and the 1960s decade. As a nation, we concentrated so heavily on the goal of placing a man on the Moon in less than ten years that we were forced to invent many new methods for managing projects and personnel. There was simply too much to be done to rely on older techniques and conventional management approaches.
The essence of the matrix management concept is simple, everyone cooperates and everyone has two supervisors for any given task. This sounds complicated, but it's not.
Individuals have a role to play, a job to do, a profession or specific skill set that must be applied to certain work steps or tasks within an overall project or portion of a project that meets some objective. Objectives and subprojects are combined and/or concatenated to achieve some overarching goal or objective. The idea is to do as many things as possible in a more or less simultaneous mode thereby maximizing the efficiency of the workers involved and shortening the time required to meet the final goal. It works.
The notion of having two supervisors is not immediately appealing to most staff members. However, when one becomes immersed in a matrix organization one learns that the job can actually become easier and good performance gets noticed. In fact, with two people performing appraisals of one's performance, the result is typically a much more fair and impartial assessment. The two supervisors review different aspects of the role one plays.
One supervisor is responsible for professional development and skill assessment of the worker. Someone to make sure you grow and develop and perform according to the standards of your field. The other supervisor is responsible for assigning specific pieces of work and assessing how you work with others, how well you meet deadlines and your contribution to the project team. It is quite normal to work on multiple projects at any given time which translates to one supervisor concerned with your professional development (if you will, your discipline), and a number of different supervisors concerned with daily work habits and production depending on the number of projects that require your skills.
There are many variations on the basic concepts of matrix management but it is clear to us that this method could be easily employed on a university campus to provide overall direction and guidance for IT staff. Regardless of administrative home in the central or distributed unit, the skills and expertise can be successfully applied to campus projects to maximize the return on investment in IT staff. We believe some variation of this approach will be necessary on university campuses in the near future. It is simply not possible to afford any other solution in the long term.
Recommendation Summary
Appendix A
General Access Labs
One example involves faculty accustomed to teaching statistics in a classroom with computers installed who chose to return to a general classroom and their former style of lecture without computers. Why? Because the general access computer labs maintained up to date equipment, installed the statistical software of choice, began offering short courses to teach the student how to use the tool set, and trained their lab consultants to assist students in the use of the software. The faculty involved grew comfortable with the service and support their students received and elected to spend their classroom time teaching theory and application of statistics rather than computer and software skills. This transition took place in only one semester of effective service.
Another example involves faculty loading their class assignments on the servers that support the general access computer labs and directing students to the labs to work on assignments and submit their finished work to another area on the same servers. Faculty were able to monitor student work from any location by accessing the servers. Faculty also began to schedule regular times for their Teaching Assistants to be in specific general access computer labs to work with their students and answer questions. Usually one or two hours once or twice per week in the late afternoon or evening worked well.
Faculty then began to actually attend the informal sessions in labs along with their Teaching Assistants. A small amount of private space was allocated immediately adjacent to a couple of the labs and faculty began using the space for impromptu lectures and/or clarification discussions with small groups of their students during the informal sessions. This developed into an immensely popular process which produced better results for the students and rejuvenated the teaching spirit in several faculty members.
Appendix B
Layered Labs
Using the School of the Arts at UWM as a recent specific example, we have a new general access computer lab located immediately adjacent to a long standing Art teaching lab filled with very high end graphics equipment and software. To maximize the utility of the new lab, we formed a partnership with Art to add a high technology layer to the new general access computer lab. The Art faculty have the connections and the ability to acquire specialized software and peripheral hardware components that allow Art majors to produce very innovative class projects. Faculty pursue grants and the Art school provides for long-term upgrades of specialized products. The central IT service units have the ability to integrate these products into the generic lab environment as long as the products chosen are carefully screened for compatibility.
The compatibility issue does require a team effort and typically involves testing to verify the vendor claims before installing new products into the lab environment. This may require a faculty member to ultimately use a product different from the one originally proposed. However, we have not yet encountered the situation where such compromise on common solutions has resulted in an adverse impact on teaching or learning. We have developed a much better working relationship and a much better solution to meet the needs of the students in the School of Art.
An interesting phenomenon resulting from this new "layered" lab and its the high level of functionality is a growing tendency for Engineering students to take advantage of the high technology and mingle with Art students.
Appendix C
Help Desk Issues
One of the most common topics raised during the campus meetings with user groups was the UWO Help Desk, its operation and perceived utility. Although this was not in the original request we are familiar with Help Desks and offer the following for your consideration.
Help Desks are difficult to run at best. Being consistently successful at satisfying the needs of your users is a task requiring dedicated staff and specialized training. One of the most difficult service provider roles in any field, but especially in the field of technology, is effectively providing help.
We have been through a variety of models and scenarios over the years trying to find a good fit for solving the university campus help desk problem. Several years ago we abandoned the model you now follow whereby individuals essentially time share the role of problem solving for campus users. Intuitively, it seems like it should work well and it seems like you are devoting the best resources you have directly to the user problems; but this model is not one that will survive the test of time and it will not provide consistently high levels of service to campus technology users. Regardless of the sincerity of effort and dedication of your staff, the model itself provides too many opportunities for failure to succeed.
To become even moderately successful at the operation of a Help Desk requires dedicated resources, professionals trained to run and manage a technology Help Desk and staff. This is an ever expanding and ever more complex segment of the technology profession with good reason. The image you portray through your Help Desk is critical to maintaining the trust of your user community ... if you will, faith in your services and abilities ... this is not area in which you can afford to anything less than your best.
A strong contingent of permanent staff members (Help Desk professionals) combined with well-trained and supervised student workers can provide high quality Help Desk services. A formal problem management system complete with sophisticated data base and reporting tools is a requirement for success. Daily detailed reports and weekly summary reports are essential and mandatory problem escalation and response policies are critical to solving problems with minimal wait time for the users.
However, the single most important ingredient in a successful Help Desk operation is a strong commitment on the part of IT management to rapid response and high quality customer service. IT management must make a commitment to constant achievement of outstanding service to the users of the Help Desk; and must implement methods by which user satisfaction levels may be measured consistently and often.
We would be happy to share our experiences in the field of Help Desk operation at your convenience, if you are interested in additional details. We do have a working model at the UWM campus that represents over 14 years of trial and error and refinement. It is far from perfect, but it works well most of the time.
Appendix D
Student Technology Services
Student Technology Services (STS) is an independent department within the Information and Media (I&MT) Division at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. It is composed entirely of students currently enrolled at UWM and employed part time by I&MT. STS employees are responsible for delivering technology and media related services to the UWM campus community in a wide variety of functional areas including the following:
A.V. Equipment Distribution Applications Development Campus Computer Labs (7) Classroom Technology Support Data Center Operation Distance Learning Help Desk (24 hour) Human Resources Network Operations Photography Local Area Networking Database Administration Public Relations Printing Services Television Engineering Technical Solutions Telephone Services Training Video/Multimedia Production Visual Design Web Maintenance/Design Graphic Arts Marketing Services Desktop Support Services
Operating departments within STS mirror those of the I&MT division and encompass both technical and administrative functions. STS is not merely staffed by students, it is entirely managed by students. Through a formal organization structure and a professional development program, students are empowered to be decision makers; manage an operating budget; supervise other students who deliver services; provide internal training; conduct performance evaluations; recruit new employees and assure high quality services to the campus.
STS employs about 300 students from virtually every academic major at UWM. Equal opportunity is extended to all students who apply regardless of academic major. As a result, most STS employees are from academic programs not normally associated with technology. Many universities employ exclusively technical majors under the belief that only technical expertise can satisfy their campus community's technology needs. STS works to dispel that belief by treating academic major as a less significant factor throughout the hiring process and, instead, concentrates on interpersonal skills, ambition, drive, and willingness to learn.
All student employees begin their tenure with STS in entry level positions and work their way up to intermediate and advanced positions in the organization. Students are encouraged to change jobs each year, moving into other departments to learn and practice new skills. Students who excel at their work, complete the training requirements, and exhibit initiative are promoted to leadership positions.
STS supervisors are responsible for the student staff in their departments and serve as role models for their peers. They manage department budgets, schedule staff, assign and manage projects, as well as undertake normal day-to-day supervisory activities. STS Supervisors of larger departments have assistant supervisors to help in managing these tasks. Full time I&MT staff members serve as mentors and are assigned to each STS department to guide and advise the STS supervisors.
STS student empowerment motivates the students to seek out roles with greater responsibility and to be held accountable for their actions and decisions. They learn to set goals for their departments and for themselves. In this way, they are developing skills necessary to further their future careers and build meaningful professional resumes. STS student empowerment is based on several key premises.
STS believes that when students are properly trained and entrusted with authority and decision making capability, they will exercise it responsibly. The success of the STS program indicates a significant positive impact on the development and preparation of the students involved. When given the opportunity, training and self confidence, students tend toward self improvement and self development; they will spur each other on in constructive competition and, when necessary, will rein each other in with self policing reactions.
The empowerment STS students acquire on the job is reinforced through a carefully tailored internal training curriculum. Successful completion of the various levels of the training matrix ensures that each student employee is competent in both technical and life skills. The technical component of the curriculum focuses on a wide variety of campus technology and troubleshooting; the life skills component focuses on customer service and professional development.
When they reach graduation and assume positions in the outside workforce, empowered STS students already possess:
The first generation of the empowered STS student workforce has already graduated and moved on to become successful professionals in their chosen fields. They are the beneficiaries of the well documented lack of qualified Information Technology workers.
The need for Information Technology workers in the state of Wisconsin is great. STS contends that there are not enough graduates with technical degrees to fill the available jobs requiring technical proficiency. Employers who limit themselves to only that pool of graduates earning technical degrees will be less successful in attracting new employees from the marketplace. They will exclude themselves from the larger pool of graduates who are proficient in both technical as well as professional work skills. By building partnerships with business, STS can fill this gap with technically proficient and technology enabled summer cooperative placements and graduates.
Among the benefits that STS Business Partners enjoy from investing in STS are:
For more information contact the STS External Program Manager, Beth Schaefer, at (414) 229-4072 or beths@uwm.edu . Or, view STS program information at http://www.uwm.edu/IMT/STS/ .