Transcript Where the Rubber Meets the Road: Two Years After Startup

Where the Rubber Meets
the Road: Two Years After
Startup
Joanne Kossuth, CIO
Pedro Perez, Assoc Dir IT
Olin College of Engineering
NERCOMP 2004
Copyright
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Copyright Joanne Kossuth and Pedro Perez 2004.
This work is the intellectual property of the author.
Permission is granted for this material to be shared
for non-commercial, educational purposes, provided
that this copyright statement appears on the
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copying is by permission of the author. To
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written permission from the author.
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Year in review
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Over the last two years a number of
projects have achieved expected and
better results while others have been
and continue to be learning
experiences
Seemingly “no brainer” best practices
all of a sudden have not been so easy
to implement
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Years in Review, Cont.
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This presentation will highlight some
of these experiences including;
Standards implementation
Growth estimation
ERP, AV, Web Design, Course
management, Knowledge
management practices, VOip
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Years in Review, Cont.
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As well as the ongoing challenges of
Leadership, growing pains, staffing,
strategic planning, network security,
network device proliferation, wireless
implications and collaboration
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The Beginning
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The Middle
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The Present
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The Ongoing
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Standards
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Standards that work(ed):
– Wiring closets
– Inter and intra building communications
– Building access
– Servers
– Network equipment
– Exchange calendaring
– Web mail
– Student laptop program
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Standards
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Standards that did not “take”:
– Desktop computers
– Laptop computers
– Printers
– PDAs
– Cell phones
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Standards
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The grey areas:
– One off applications
– Linux builds
– E-mail aliases
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Required [email protected] for faculty and
staff
Required [email protected] for
students
One alias per person
– Listservs
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Estimating Growth
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Underestimation seems to be the rule
– Mail system and the temporary Netscape system
aka the daily crash
– Modular units that have a bad habit of returning
– Olin.edu space and maintenance e.g. a founding
faculty member requiring ownership of
ece.olin.edu
– Server proliferation and lack of limitations in
promoting “innovation”
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Estimating Growth Cont.
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Capacity planning
Peak loads
Bandwidth and management
Can you define mission critical?
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VOIP
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A good decision
Cost effective, stable, scalable
Easy ROI when starting from scratch, harder when
converting
Don’t forget network hardware requirements such
as QOS
Even better news, local telco offices are starting the
switch to ip based services e.g. Nortel and Verizon
Next up…multimedia presence and follow me but
don’t forget the bandwidth requirements and ability
of network hardware to handle multicast as well as
unicast
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Knowledge Management
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Issue of losing older documents in clean up
e.g. curricular planning
Dependence on e-mail for communication
…cc’s, attachments, etc.
We’re small, we all Have to Know Everything
Defining good communications…why are
certain people ALWAYS left out?
Rounding up the startup cowboys
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Wireless
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Addiction of freshman
Recovery of sophomores
– CAD, registration
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Designed as an complimentary
network to wired access
Visitors, neighbors and other
complicating factors
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Network Device
Proliferation
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The possibility of registration of systems
Challenges of multi platform e.g. Linux,
MAC, PC, Xboxes, APs etc
Leading the way in convergence means
leading the way on the number of
networked devices
The challenge of management, identification
and authorization in a collaborative work
environment
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AV
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Video over ip
Leading edge apps
Faculty don’t need any stinking AV
Oops, faculty need AV and how about
by tomorrow
What happens when your vendor goes
chapter 11 mid project?
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ERP
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Startup
– What do we have to have now
– Implications on out of order and partial
implementations
– Scope expansion
– Current state
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Web Design
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Evolution from outsourced to insourced
Co-sourced redesign
From focus groups to web design committee
Ongoing design and redesign
Shared governance with Communications
Office
Never ending process
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Olin College Website
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Course Management
System
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Interim use as KM tool
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Issues
Redesign
Communication
Alternatives
In Progress
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Syllabi in one place
Course catalog
Links to portal project and other tools
Student use
Development
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Intranet
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Another interim solution
– Part communication
– Part documentation
– Migration to course management system
and web sites
– But what about those special applications
that were just made for us???
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Vendors
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Relationships and partnerships
Who gets what
Care and feeding on an ongoing basis
Talking the talk and walking the walk
Keeping everyone honest
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Vendor Partners
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Nortel Networks
Voice and Data Network hardware
Integrated Partners Corp Nortel integrator/reseller
Symbol
Wireless access point vendor and Nortel
partner
TAC Center
Voice over IP maintenance provider
MTS Services
Cabling contractor
(voice/data/AV/controls/security)
NORDX/CDT
Cabling and connectivity product manufacturer/supplier
APC
UPS vendor
HP
Server vendor, network printer manufacturer, and staff/faculty laptop
option
Micron
Desktop vendor
Dell
Student Laptop program and
staff/faculty laptop option
Ricoh
Leased high speed multi function
copier/printer/scanner
ImageTech
Maintenance of Ricoh equipment
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Security
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Closed versus open
The role of research
What the faculty bring with them
An interim solution
Why the let them stick their finger in
the light socket approach can work
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Contingency Planning
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Redundancy
Fail over
Defining mission critical
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Leadership
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VPs and President never held their
positions before
Education process
Multiple reporting relationships for
CIO…good or bad
Having a voice
– Details versus issues
– Why the politics matters
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Collaboration
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Successes
Failures
Looking ahead…challenges such as
half of our student population cross
registering for courses at other
institutions
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Strategic Planning
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Where is the plan
How do we get a plan
What about an IT plan
What about an inter-institutional IT
plan
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Adolescence
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The impact of a small community on
relationships and governance
Family versus business
From one voice per person to one
voice per group e.g. representation
Consensus versus my way or the
highway
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Staffing
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The challenges of staffing at a very
small institution that also wants to
provide lots of services, especially to
students
Benchmarking project
The expectation games
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The Olin Top Picks
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Converged network
VOip
Vendor partnerships and relationships
Student IT Working Group
Laptop Program
The IT Web page (still in progress)
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The Olin Top Challenges
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Support expectations and growth
Network device proliferation
Identification, Authentication and
Authorization across campus
collaborations
Guest and community access
Ongoing education of leadership
The rate of technological change
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Contact Information
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Joanne Kossuth
[email protected] or 781-2922431
Pedro Perez
[email protected] or 781-2922435
NERCOMP 2004