First Year Shock and Awe

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Your Career :: The New CIO

First Year Shock and Awe

1/1/2008

By Dian Schaffhauser

Administrators and staffers were shocked when the new CIO declared, 'We're not going to do anything for a year.'

First Steps

During his first year, Masson has focused on a few key areas. The first: establishing an operational budget, which hadn't existed before. "We went through the last three years of purchases," he says, explaining, "If we paid for something, it must be for some reason." From that budget, his team devised a list of the services IT was delivering, which were then organized into five business units: central systems for managing enterprise software; infrastructure to handle the data center, network, and telecommunications; campus technical services for user and desktop support; distance learning; and the print shop.

The redefinition continues. "We're looking at [the help desk], and whether it should be its own entity," he says. "Moving that out might provide an opportunity for project management and IT governance. If we can use that as a tactical resource for identifying needs based on call volumes, we can roll that up as a metric for determining project prioritization."

The goal, Masson says, is to provide a structure that allows people to have authority and autonomy. Along the way, he hopes to engender a collaborative environment with bottomup decision-making and iterative design methods.

He concedes the staff is probably frustrated with the slow pace of change. "I think some people were expecting me to come in and say, 'OK, do it this way.' They wanted quick results," he admits, but adds, "I'm really interested in creating an environment where people understand how the decisions are made, and feel a part of [the process].... It's not a top-down approach."

-Dian Schaffhauser writes about higher ed technology for online and print publications. Share your career stories and advice with her at editors@campus-technology.com (mark your subject line "Career").

Dian Schaffhauser is a writer who covers technology and business. Send your higher education technology news to her at dian@dischaffhauser.com.