Disruptive technologies and the implications for University Information Services - Part 2: The way forward

Disruptive technology and its implications for University Information Services –
Part 2: The way forward
Dr Joe Nicholls (Principal Consultant, Universities Future Group) & David Harrison
(Assistant Director, Strategy & Enablement) – Information Services, Cardiff University.
Introduction
In an earlier briefing paper we discussed the issues for University Information Services needed to
face in deciding how to position themselves to continue to provide services that continue to be
wanted and valued by their institution. In this second paper, we build upon the challenges to discuss
and propose a “philosophical basis for Information Services” in an ever-changing world.
Future opportunities for the University through web services?
Pros and cons of internal versus external development and provision of web services
When it comes to web services what will be a University’s unique selling point? With ongoing rapid
commercial development of web technologies, it is debatable how much of what Universities have
traditionally provided via centralised services they should continue to be delivered and maintained
in this way. They are clearly well placed to design web services/applications that enable core
administrative businesses processes. JISC funding initiatives and the e-Framework have already
kick-started work in this are. A key strategic issue is deciding how much resource and effort to
devote to in-house solutions that don’t address core business processes. Similarly, the University
will have to decide what will be of benefit to continue to provide and support itself and what will be
better for staff and students to acquire for themselves from external third parties.
It is arguable that the rate of innovation and production of new web services is far exceeding that
which could be achieved by Information Service departments in Colleges and Universities working
in isolation. They will be looking to form mutually beneficial partnerships with commercial
technology vendors with an interest in the HE/FE market place.
Even more than with portal frameworks, there will be a huge and increasing variety of portlets to
choose from. There will be hard sells and incentives for people to integrate and use bespoke
applications or services. Students and staff alike will be presented with opportunities to sign-up to
complete pre-packaged portal environments already customised and populated with content to their
needs.
With the aim of establishing competitive advantage, early identification and gaining access to
technology alone won’t achieve this. Only through timely and appropriate training and education
will people be able to take advantage of new capabilities.
A learner’s relationship with the University can and should start well before they enrol as a
graduate. Web based portal technologies create the opportunity for the University to reach out and –
student experience – student lifecycle.
To do this we need to find out and understand how technology is changing the way people live and
work. Only then, when considered in the context of a person’s academic role, can Information
Services be better placed to enable people to make better use of technology for academic tasks.
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Complex societal and cultural forces work to influence the uptake and success of a technology, e.g.
SMS. Such factors as fashion, the media and peer group pressure all interact to determine what
achieves critical mass uptake and adopted as standard. The University has a role not only to respond
and adapt to these trends but through doing so put itself in a position to innovate and lead.
The process of designing and building new services and applications
Agile methods, which involve users early on in the design and development cycle.
Mentoring, tutoring, facilitating – loads of piloting, demonstrations etc.
How do we work to bridge the gap between users and the capabilities afforded by technology?
Where should we focus our efforts to innovate? Inline with the goals and aspirations of the
institution.
How much of what we currently do would be better out-sourced? Not necessarily out-sourced or
facility managed, but shared services. How many implementations of a Virtual Learning
Environment are needed? To some extent there will be uniqueness is in the content. Control access
to that and you can provide it as a shared service.
Need to rethink and addressing what employers want from graduates. Focus on the generic,
transferable skills. Yes, build on the generation Y way of producing a workforce that is fit to lead
and whose barriers are only the limits of their imagination.
Rethinking how researchers work – achieving better alignment with the institution’s strategic
objectives – creating the circumstances for brining about what is often thought to be incidental or
opportunistic, enabling better communication – making connections
complementary principles for ‘Senior Management’ and for ‘Staff/ Students’. The changing
dynamics of working relationships within the University that need to be explore in the context of
‘disruptive technology’.
A given – streamlining core business process - a lot of attention given to efficiency and
effectiveness gains that can be achieved through re-engineering administrative business processes
that are common throughout the organisation. Individual learners, teachers and researchers will
undoubtedly benefit from this. It will reduce the amount of time and effort spent doing these tasks
which are an overhead to main their main job of work. However, this alone will take considerable
time and effort to realise, at the expense of promoting and enabling technology use in areas more
peripheral within the organisation.
Academic staff and students rightly consider that central institutional services are there to help them
achieve their learning and research goals.
There are new and better ways for staff and students to do this. It should be the job of ‘central staff’
to not only expose and make available new tools/services, but also envision how the tools could be
used to enable people to transform the way they work for the better.
Towards a new way of thinking and working
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The ‘Service Provider’ and the role of ‘Service Provision’ are still appropriate and relevant
constructs, but there are powerful arguments that they need to be embraced in a philosophy of
‘enablement’. Traditional Service Providers must work to become more aware of, understand and
represent the needs of individuals/groups as well as those of the institution. Central support staff
play an important role in helping people align themselves and the work they do with the goals and
objectives of the institution. But they are also well placed to represent and communicate any
disparity between the needs of the individual and institutional drivers. This information is important
for determining what technology is implemented in support of what tasks. This process highlights
the significance of relationship between Staff/Students – ‘Service Providers’ – Senior Management.
Senior management have greater ownership and understanding of the institution’s strategic
imperatives and goals, and the broad sweeping organisational changes and processes required to
achieve these. What they are less in touch with, for perfectly practical and logistical reasons, is what
people are experiencing at the coal face. It is the Enablement Team’s role to gather, represent and
convey the needs and requirements of people in performing their daily tasks, and also for assessing
the gap between what’s achievable now and in the future.
Service Provider as intermediary and coordinator, establishing channels of communication between
those who want to make effective use of technology for their work and the people responsible for
designing, building or procuring new applications and services.
Service Providers as
A shift in perspective is required:
• from User/Customer to Person/Colleague
• from Support to Enablement
• from Service to Partnership
• …to Relationships
Work to establish principles that underpin…
• person centred-ness
• partnership
• enablement
• team working and collaboration
• appropriate and effective communication
These changes in perspective and revised principles are needed because…[developing rational and
explanation below]
n.b. These will be difficult to adopt and adhered to without careful re-thinking of the way
Information Services, and specifically the ‘Enablement Team’ work.
From support to enablement
From service to relationship
The meaning of ‘service’ has the connotation of being something that is unidirectional, i.e.,
something that is given by the service provider to the user or customer. Where the service provider
is primarily concerned with making sure that the product/tool/service that is intended is exactly
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what is accessed/received/used by the user/customer, and is less concerned about what happens
after the point of delivery.
This attitude and approach will no longer suffice. Service Providers, or in the new era the
‘Enablement Team’, must now seek to engage and work with people beyond the traditional ‘point-
of-delivery’.
Many existing high quality services are often rigidly structured and thought/effort will have to be
directed to making these more agile and responsive to changes in user needs. The Enablement Team
must seek to gain a better understanding the expectations of people and how products/tools/services
are intended to be used to achieve tasks. Only in this way can the gap between what is needed and
what is provided be narrowed.
Information Services must wake up to the fact that they no longer have their finger well placed on
‘the pulse of technology change’. We have less awareness and understanding of how new and
emerging technologies impact on how people work. The services provided to date have mainly been
reactive and demand driven. The result a limited surface level view of the daily problems/issues
people face, mostly concerning existing services and not about the challenges people face with their
work or the way that it is changing or how they might like to work. ‘Service Providers’ just haven’t
engaged with people in this way (there are deterrents: it is costly and perceived to require additional
time and effort on top of the daily baseline work, its value and impact is often deferred and can be
tangential to what is actually done – the important thing is that the results and products of this work
are incremental and will have cumulative value.
The value of a person-centred approach
If Information Services are to embrace new ‘disruptive’ technologies so as to enable new ways of
working in the University, it has to first extend itself and work beyond the traditional point of
delivery. It will require new ways of thinking about and engaging with students and staff. A more
conducive approach might be to adopt a more holistic perspective and think of the ‘user’ more as a
person; as someone juggling multiple roles in differing contexts, i.e., adopt a person-centred
approach to enablement. This is something that has long been espoused in health and social
services. It promotes more in depth and sensitive understanding of what people want to achieve
with technology/services and the challenges/obstacles they experience.
The way forward: collaboration and partnership
There are likely to be issues concerning the motivation and willingness of Services Providers to
engage proactively and to change their working practices.
There is the perennial problem of tackling the resistance and suspicion of difficult staff and schools.
We strive to move away from the ‘them and us’ mentality. We must not been seen as people who
impose technology or solutions upon people.
What’s the relevance and value of adopting an approach that seeks to establish a relationship, or a
‘partnership’ between central support service providers and those who make use of the services?
For partnerships to work and be beneficial they need to be appreciated and wanted by all parties
involved. In most cases value and benefit from the partnership will have to be perceived as being
mutual and balanced. A potential issue may occur because the products and outcomes of learning,
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teaching and researching are more obviously and directly associated with learners, teachers and
researchers, and not with the people involved in enabling them. All members of the partnership
must believe they get something from the collaboration and that their contribution it is appreciated
in a positive way (this could be as simple as increased recognition and appreciation from colleagues
– respect, kudos in a form that is meaningful and not patronising. The basis of this could possibly
be embedded as part of the evaluation processes (?) or project reviews [to be developed].
The importance and value of ‘partnership’ and ‘collaborative endeavour’ are best understood and
appreciated when framed by the ‘big picture’ and long-term view of where the organisation is going
How will we know if we’re successful?
What will it mean in practice?
A big challenge is finding out when technology is being effectively harnessed.
for the Enablement Team is identification and realisation of ‘added value’. Added value occurs
when people are empowered to do things that go beyond the basic use of tools/services to do routine
activities. Added value results and is experienced when someone can perform a task in a better way
resulting in an outcome/product of discernable better quality or it is done in more efficient (less
cost/effort) way.
[n.b. relevance and application of LEAN principles, but also innovation in relation to tasks and the
way they’re performed.]
Wherever and whenever possible the Enablement Team (Service Provider) should adopt a proactive
rather than reactive approach to enablement, i.e., taking the initiative to communicate with people
to find out more about what is required for them to achieve greater success with their work.
The Enablement Team, along with others, should find out what technologies and web services are
being used productively outside the university. Explore new processes and new ways of working
and think innovatively about how tools and services could be used.
Explore the need for, and value of, principles that work to establish and maintain communication,
working relationships and partnerships
Millennials Rising: The Next Great Generation /by Neil Howe and Bill Strauss
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