Gareth Edwards

Department of Engineering

Science, University of

Oxford

20th May 2015

“What are the challenges of leading the

provision of IT in a world leading

science, teaching and research

environment?

How would you develop

strategies to achieve these?”

SourcesAnd

Approach

PeersExperience

Understanding of context

5 Challenges

3 Cross-cutting

solutions

Based onexperience

Challenges

Scale

… of the academic endeavour.

Scale

How it manifests:- Physical

space- Technolog

y- Organisati

on

Scale

Challenge:- Keeping

up to date- Working

together- Being

responsive

External Factors

- Funding body rules

- Commercial agreements

External Factors

- Regulatory

- Information Security

The Student Experience

- Sector changes

- Competition

- Expectations

The Student Experience

- Quality of facilities

- Changing approaches to teaching

The Pace of Academic Change

- Supporting cutting-edge science

- Curriculum

The Pace of Academic Change

- Academic staff focus

- Invisible vs Proactive IT

The Pace of Change in IT

- Knowledge & skills

- Not just technology, methodology!

The Pace of Change in IT

- Cutting edge IT benefits a cutting edge organisation

ScaleExternal Factors

The Student

ExperienceAcademic

ChangeTechnology

Change

Strategies

Strategies

Communication

Organisation Improvement

Communication

Communication with

colleagues

- Formal and structured

- Informal

- Skills needed

Communication with

colleagues

- Cope with scale

- Awareness of changes

- Enables proactivity

Communication(external /

liaison)

- Department / Divisional

- Collaboration & awareness

Communication(external /

liaison)

- Funding bodies

- Commercial partners

- Sector Organisations

Communication internally

- Shared direction

- Collaboration

- Can be technology driven!

Organisation

- To realise the value of information

- Service oriented approach

Organisation

- Consistent methods

- Project Management

- Service Planning

Organisation

- Feedback part of practice

- Standards: i.e. resilience, BYOD

Improvement and

Innovation

Communication +

Organisation=

Improvement Programme

Improvement and

Innovation

- Innovation & community feedback

- Encourage new ideas

Improvement and

Innovation

- Professional Development

- Conferences & networking

- Celebrate success

In Summary

Thank you

Gareth Edwards 14 t h May 2015