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Developing a Strategic Support Plan
10/20/2005
Clearly, the need to consolidate resources for greater efficiency is a key strategic issue that other schools ought to seriously consider. Most universities typically have several separate help desks of varying sizes that have grown up over time, due to the vagaries of budgeting and departmental empire-building. Yet, Moran and his group realized that a single consolidated help desk would not only be able to give far better support than three or four separate units scattered about in different departments across the campus, but consolidation of the groups would result in lower costs overall.
Capturing the Data
By recording all pertinent details of all cases, the new incident tracking system enables Moran and his team to make some informed choices.
“One change was the purchase and installation of a software system to enable users to reset their own passwords,” Moran comments. “The justification for the purchase came from the fact that the most common call to the help desk was for forgotten passwords.” The team now analyzes the number and types of calls to determine the timetable for moving resources from support to development and innovation.
Staffing
The team’s report defined the number of professional staff members that would be needed, and summarized their duties and the new workflow. The restructuring of the organization showed Moran that other changes would be required as well.
“Hiring has changed,” he says. “We look first for teamplayer mentality now. The team is everything. The ‘lone techie,’ no matter how smart, will simply not work in this scheme.” The CIO even admits that a few of his staffers have left because they knew they wouldn’t fit into the new scheme, but he notes philosophically that “you can’t change what people are. You have to accept what talents they have and don’t have, and create an environment that allows them to perform.”
Universal Principles
The re-engineering of King’s College’s IT support benefited from some significant advantages that should be recognized: First, King’s College is a small institution, making the endeavor more straightforward than it would no doubt be in a larger institution. Second, the effort had presidential backing—no minor detail in the success of any initiative. Finally, the budget was made available to implement the recommendations, in terms of purchasing technology to enable the changes to work. But strategic details such as presidential and financial support are no less crucial at any higher education institution, and the specific points of the recommendation of Moran’s team are equally valid for any school. Consolidation of disparate help desk units into a single cohesive unit, if properly thought through and executed, can result in newfound efficiency. What’s more, the ability to analyze the data from all support requests campuswide will allow the IT group to make better decisions about technology purchases, training, and allocation of support resources.
Perhaps the key question you now should be asking yourself is: Can you get presidential backing for an IT support re-engineering effort at your school? We’ll save that one for another column.
Mikael Blaisdell is principal of mikael blaisdell & associates (www.mblaisdell.com), an IT support consultancy.
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