it assessment executive summary.pdf

The Pennsylvania State University

IT Assessment Executive Summary

Final Summary of Recommendations June 16, 2011

Goldstein & Associates, LLC

Contents

Section Page

Introduction 3

Summary Recommendations 6

Strategic Context 10

IT Snapshot 12

IT Service Improvements 18

IT Governance 28

Attachment A – IT Snapshot Methodology and Glossary 35

Attachment B – IT Snapshot Data Charts 40

Attachment C – Discussion of IT Improvement Opportunities 59

Attachment D – Proposed IT Governance Committee Charges 81

2

Introduction

3

Introduction

This report is the culmination of a University-wide assessment of information technology that has its origins in goal 6 of the University strategic plan.

The IT Assessment has three broad goals:

To quantify and understand the University’s current level of investment in technology.

To recommend changes to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of IT services with particular focus on optimizing the balance between distributed and common services.

To recommend changes to IT governance (planning, prioritization, assessment and decision-making) to improve the University’s collective ability to manage its investment in technology.

The IT Assessment is a University-led, consultant facilitated project.

An Executive Committee of administrative and academic leaders were the recipients of the consultant’s recommendations.

An Advisory Committee of IT leaders from colleges, campuses, administrative and academic leaders helped interpret the analysis and develop the recommendations.

A project work team from ITS and the Controller’s office helped design and execute the data collection and analytical work of the project.

The project consultant facilitated the analysis, provided independent, objective judgment and formulated the recommendations contained in this report. To the extent possible, the consensus support of the Advisory was sought for each recommendation.

4

Introduction

The IT assessment included extensive interviews with budget executives and IT leaders from

campuses, colleges, academic and administrative units.

Data was collected from all areas of the University to quantify IT related personnel activities,

non-personnel IT expenditures and IT service offerings. A detailed description of the data

collection effort and a glossary of terms is included as an attachment to this report.

The Advisory Committee had extensive discussion of the data collection findings and met

several times to provide input to the design of revised governance processes.

Informational briefings were held to review project progress and findings with the ITLC, the

IAS and AIS Steering Committees, the ITS leadership team and the ITS staff.

5

Summary Recommendations

6


Information technology is a sizeable investment and a strategic asset. To maximize its

effectiveness in a time of growing demand, constrained resources, and rapid technological

change requires consistent, proactive management.

Penn State has and will continue to require distributed and central IT organizations and

common and unique services. However, the current alignment of IT services and IT

organizations is not optimal.

To improve the effectiveness of technology and better balance common and distributed IT

services, the University should:

Deploy a common email and calendaring solution for faculty and staff.

Create a new University service to meet the shared needs for long-term data storage and

archiving.

Expand ITS’ server co-location and virtualization services in a manner that is cost

competitive with units providing the service on their own. Commit first to increasing the

utilization of this service for administrative applications that require high availability and

redundancy.

Extend the ITS computer lab management service to all campuses and colleges and begin

to develop a similar solution to manage administrative desktops.

7


To improve the effectiveness of technology and achieve more optimal balance of common and

distributed IT services, the University should (continued):

Reduce the cost of software purchases by extending the use of shared, server based

software licenses instead of licensing software for every individual computer.

Implement a common help desk system and knowledge base to improve the productivity

of IT staff and the quality of user support services.

Make wireless networking at University Park a common service to achieve greater

network coverage and a more consistent experience for faculty, students and staff as they

move about the campus.

To oversee the implementation of these changes and provide on-going, proactive management

of IT at Penn State, the University should implement a revised IT governance model. Key

aspects include:

Designate the Provost, Senior Vice President for Finance and Business and the Vice Provost

and Chief Information Officer as the final decision-makers for IT.

Appoint an IT Board comprised of representative deans, chancellors, vice presidents and

senior IT leaders to approve strategic directions, approve IT policies, designate common IT

services and prioritize the most significant IT investments.

Empower the IT Board to oversee the development of a strategic IT plan for Penn State.

8

Summary Recommendations To oversee the implementation of these changes and provide on-going, proactive

management of IT at Penn State, the University should implement a revised IT governance

model (continued).

Appoint domain specific governance committees comprised of faculty, staff and IT

providers to identify emerging needs, recommend annual work priorities, recommend

standards, and sponsor university-wide improvement initiatives.

Appoint University-wide coordinating committees for IT architecture, security and

services to recommend standards, develop solutions and monitor the effectiveness of

the IT environment.

Establish the ITLC and the ITLC Board as a sounding board for major ITS decisions and

a coordinating body to foster collaboration among all IT units.

The planning and governance frameworks should be used to establish long-range

plans for several strategic issues.

The University should modernize its enterprise information systems and associated

business processes.

More extensive research computing services delivered by ITS and distributed IT groups

should be created in alignment with the University’s research growth and the

recommendations of the Cyber-science task force.

Additional capabilities should be developed by ITS and distributed IT groups to support

anticipated growth in the use of instructional technology as course content becomes more

digital and interactive.

9

Context

10

Strategic Context Technology is critical to multiple University strategies.

Growth in on-line learning programs depends on increasingly sophisticated technology to market, develop, deliver and support on-line programs

Global expansion and collaboration requires technologies that enable the University to deliver its intellectual assets and expertise seamlessly to faculty, students, and staff anywhere they learn and work.

Research relies on computing capacity to perform complex calculations at incredible speeds, tools that collect, organize and visualize data in ways that promote understanding and infrastructure that enables researchers to organize and share their work products.

Effective teaching and learning is increasingly enabled by technology in all disciplines. Simulations, interactive content, e-books and mobile devices are becoming integrated components of learning inside and outside the traditional classroom.

IT at Penn State has evolved without an overall blueprint to drive its effectiveness.

It is appropriate and necessary for Penn State to have both distributed and central IT groups. However, their activities must be well-coordinated to preserve a unique focus for each, leverage on-going technology change, and ensure common solutions continue to meet the institution’s need.

Today, PSU’s IT units have areas of overlapping capabilities and services, priorities for investment are difficult to set and align with institutional goals, and there are too few mechanisms to manage the quality of technology services.

Achieving a better balance of distributed and common services will save money, create additional capacity to invest in strategic technologies, and enable distributed IT units to focus on the unique needs of the faculty, students and staff they support.

Improving IT governance will provide the mechanisms necessary to allocate resources effectively, set priorities that are aligned with strategic goals, and foster accountability.

11

IT Snapshot

12

IT Snapshot Penn State invests nearly $250 million annually in personnel and non-personnel expenditures to

provide and support information technology. There are more than 1,600 FTE providing IT support distributed across more than 52 organizations.

There is an opportunity to direct more IT support towards strategic and unique IT services.

Significant effort is required to sustain the foundational technologies of the University. Support for administrative applications (441 FTE), user support (388 FTE,), and networks, servers and desktop hardware support (356 FTE) consume the majority of staff time.

Comparatively fewer resources are providing direct support to research computing (67 FTE) and academic technology (133 FTE).

Across all colleges, 53% of staff effort is allocated to the installation and support of desktop hardware, software, networks, servers, troubleshooting and support. Comparatively less effort is available for consulting with faculty, supporting courseware and learning management systems (14%), or providing direct support to research grants (12%).

Across all campuses, 62% of staff effort is allocated to the installation and support of desktop hardware, software, networks, servers, troubleshooting and support. to the installation and support of desktop hardware, software.

Estimated Personnel Costs (salary and benefits) $129,360,000

Non Personnel Expenditures $119,013,799

Total Expenditures (FY10) $248,373,799

13

IT Effort By Area and Function

55.6

0.0

20.1 45.0

0.6

231.5 78.3

18.0

53.7

56.2

166.2

25.4

53.6 81.6 24.1

22.8

0.5

2.2 38.1

0.7

16.2

6.6 9.6

14.5

2.4

154.0

40.9 44.9 70.4

60.6

154.6

15.6 11.3 25.9 16.1

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Academic Support Units Administrative Support

Units

Campuses Colleges Penn State Hershey -

Hospital

Other (224)

Support (371)

Security (49)

Research Computing (64)

Infrastructure (351)

Applications (438)

Academic Technology (121)

14

IT Snapshot

IT units in colleges and campuses vary significantly in scale. Variability is a by-product of

differences in mission, differing levels of adoption of ITS services, and management decisions

regarding the resources invested in technology.

Campus IT groups range in size from 4 to 19 FTE with an average size of 7.

College IT groups rang from 8 to 50 FTE, with an average of 22.

Some IT groups further sub-divide within a college or administrative division into smaller,

departmental IT groups.

The overall structure for IT leaves some organizations sized below an optimal and efficient

scale. It requires staff to be broad generalists sustaining many fragmented duties. It also

makes it difficult to harness and redeploy productivity gains that accrue from improving a

service as they are fragmented across many FTE.

Ratio Colleges Campuses Academic and Admin Support

High Avg. Low High Avg. Low High Avg. Low

Faculty, Student and

Staff per IT FTE

479 182 62 603 244 127 NA NA NA

IT Expenditures as

% of Total

Expenditures

9.5% 5.3% 2.9% 10.3% 6.0% 2.9% 20.0% 7.9% 1.1%

Student Credit

Hours Per IT FTE*

13,001 5,442 963 14,078 6,683 1,705 NA NA NA

15

IT Snapshot

The opportunity to optimize the alignment of services also exists among academic and

administrative support units (see chart on following page).

Excluding ITS, University Park academic and administrative support units had 448 FTE

devoted to IT support in FY10. These FTE resided in 15 different budget exec areas many of

which further sub-divide into smaller IT groups attached to particular departments.

Application support is among the largest categories of activity with 184 FTE outside of ITS

devoted to designing, developing and maintaining databases, custom and commercial

administrative applications, web sites and reports. Providing user support to the staffs

working in academic and administrative organizations requires an additional 96 FTE.

These application and support activities complement and in some cases overlap with ITS

services.

The data also reveals areas that warrant investment in efficiency and productivity improvements

because they consume a significant portion of the total IT effort.

Activity Total FTE

Troubleshoot issues 149.3

Maintain servers 129.0

Maintain desktops 88.6

Answer user question 87.0

Design, develop and support web sites 85.0

Develop custom administrative applications 76.4 16

Application and User Support FTE

2.1

5.1

35.7

23.0

1.3

26.8

11.7

18.5

0.8

49.2

0.4

1.3

2.8

5.2

0.7

0.6

21.3

17.1

0.2

7.6

7.1

4.7

1.2

25.7

1.1

1.1

4.4

2.8

0.0 10.0 20.0 30.0 40.0 50.0 60.0

Global Programs

Graduate School

World Campus/Outreach

Research

Schreyer's Honors College

Undergraduate Education

University Libraries

Development and Alumni Relations

Educational Equity

Finance and Business

Intercollegiate Athletics

Office of the President

Student Affairs

University Relations

Aca

dem

ic S

uport

Adm

in S

upport

User Support Application Development and Maintenance

ITS FTE

Applications – 125.8

User support – 99.5

17

Priority Improvement

Opportunities

18

Improvement Opportunities

In consultation with the Advisory Committee, seven opportunities to improve the efficiency

and effectiveness of IT services were identified.

Opportunities were identified based on their potential to reduce costs, create significant

productivity gains that would enable IT staff members to focus on higher priorities, reduce

risk, and improve support for a strategic University objective.

Other factors considered included the degree of technical and organizational readiness to

implement the changes required and the importance of a proposed change to realizing future

opportunities to improve IT services.

These opportunities are a starting point. Long-term, the University needs to build on these

changes to address a strategic technology agenda that includes the modernization of its

administrative systems, a comprehensive data center strategy and enhanced support for

teaching and research. However, these opportunities are an important foundation for

collaboration and represent significant opportunities to enhance highly utilized IT services.

The table on the following page identifies the seven opportunities and briefly establishes the

rationale for change. On the following pages, a set of criteria are introduced that have been

used to evaluate the potential of each opportunity. A detailed discussion of each opportunity

can be found in Attachment C.

19

Improvement Opportunities

20

Opportunity Adopt a single

solution for

faculty and

staff email.

Shared

solution for

data archiving

Expand

support for

virtualization

and co-

location

Expand client

management

for labs,

classrooms

and desktop

computers.

Expand

software

license

management.

Shared service

desk software

Wireless as

common

good.

Rationale Reduces

expenditures

to maintain

separate

solutions.

Demonstrates

will to

collaborate.

More

economical

and feasible to

create

University-

wide.

Important to

research

compliance.

Leverage

economies of

scale and

expertise.

Reduce risk

for systems

requiring high

availability and

security.

Significant

productivity

gains.

Improved

energy

utilization.

Reduced cost

to license

software for

labs and

individual

computers.

Improved

productivity

for 200 FTE

providing

support.

Better

service.

Close gaps in

wireless

coverage at

UP

Provide

consistent

user

experience.

Improvement Opportunities – Analytical

Framework

Criteria Rating Description

Cost Savings/Cost

Avoidance

Recurring savings or cost avoidance of

approximately $250,000 or less.

Recurring savings or cost avoidance of $250,000

to $1,000,000.

Recurring savings or cost avoidance over $1

million.

Productivity Small gains in individual productivity.

Large gains in productivity that enable portions of

time to be focused on higher priorities.

Substantial gains in productivity that enable

positions to be focused on higher priorities.

Risk Risk is managed more efficiently.

Risk is reduced.

Required to protect a strategic asset or

compliance with mandatory regulations 21

Improvement Opportunities – Summary

Assessment

Opportunity Cost Savings Cost

Avoidance

Improved

Productivity

Reduced Risk

Email/ Calendar

Storage/Archivi

ng

NA

Virtualization/c

o-location

Client

management

labs and

desktops

License

management

NA NA

Service desk NA NA

Wireless NA

22

Implementation Considerations

23

These opportunities were selected because the Advisory Committee assessed

there to be a high degree of readiness at the University. However, each will present

its own challenges as changes are implemented. It will be important to keep the

users and providers of these services well informed of how their service

experience will be impacted by the proposed changes.

The table on the following page presents a preliminary assessment of some of the

cultural and organizational implementation challenges that lie ahead. The ITLC

should work with ITS leadership to create strategies to manage these challenges.

Implementation Considerations

24

Opportunity Implementation Considerations

Email/Calendar Highly personal application used by many. Will be an initial fear of loss of

choice of preferred software as well as transition issues such as synching

with multiple computers and devices.

Storage/Archiving New service, so resistance should be low. Will be important to clarify that

this does not limit choice of short-term storage for scientific data.

Virtualization and

co-location

Primarily impacts distributed IT staff. Will require service level agreements

and metrics to build confidence in common service.

Client

management

Potentially broad impact on distributed IT staff, students and faculty. While

there should be no loss of capability experienced by users of labs and

classrooms, this will need to be well communicated.

License

management

Will impact faculty and staff used to having all software resident on their

hard drives. Will require communications and some training.

Service desk Primarily impacts distributed IT staff. Will require service level agreements

and metrics to build confidence in common service.

Wireless Primarily impacts distributed IT staff. Will require service level agreements

and metrics to build confidence in common service and clarify locally

maintained control over wireless provisioning. Also, clear guidelines for

sharing costs need to be established.

Improvement Opportunities – Next Steps

Working in concert with the ITLC, ITS should refine the investment requirements

and implementation plans for the seven areas.

The newly formed senior governance board (see next section) should review the

final cost benefit analyses and prioritize the implementation of the first seven. For

the Board’s consideration, the following initial priorities are recommended:

Begin by extending the CLM service to all campuses.

Second, begin deployment of the common email and calendar solution.

Extend the CLM service to additional colleges and pilot a companion service for

administrative desktops.

Expand the license management program.

Expand co-location and virtualization capabilities and consolidate administrative

applications into ITS run data centers.

Continue work on the design of a University-wide data archiving and storage

solution.

25

Beyond the Initial Opportunities

26

Once the implementation of the initial opportunities is underway, the University

should build on this foundation for collaboration and the new mechanisms for

planning created by the governance framework (see next section) to address

several strategic technology issues.

The IT assessment was not intended to establish a long-range IT plan for Penn

State. That work must follow this project. However, the resource analysis and

qualitative interviews conducted for the Assessment confirmed the importance of

resolving several strategic issues. They are described briefly below.

The University needs to establish a strategy to modernize its enterprise

administrative systems (IBIS, ISIS) and expand its portfolio to include solutions

for human resources and comprehensive research administration. The strategy

must set priorities and timelines for systems replacement and should establish a

preference for package applications or developed open source solutions. The

strategy should seek to leverage recent developments in hosted applications to

manage the cost of implementation and facilitate standardization of business

processes.

Beyond the Initial Opportunities

27

Priorities for expanding technology support for research and teaching should be developed.

The IT Assessment confirmed that the University has an opportunity to increase its

investment in direct support for the use of technology in teaching and research as it changes

its approach to providing common IT services. Long-term, the University must weigh

additional investments that must be made in academic and research technologies to support

institutional strategies to increase their utilization in order to support institutional growth. As

services expand, IT governance groups must be engaged in planning the optimal organizational

placement of responsibility for these services.

IT Governance

28

Goals

Penn State requires an improved IT governance structure to proactively manage its

technology services and resources.

Engaged governance structures and processes are required to implement the outcomes of

the IT Assessment and make optimizing the University’s investment in IT a continuous

process.

Engaged governance is also critical to building greater trust and stronger connections

among the various IT units.

Revised IT governance will direct IT planning, coordinate distributed and central IT services,

identify project priorities and measure the effectiveness of IT at Penn State. Governance will:

Align IT priorities and investments with institutional strategies and objectives.

Maximize the benefits the University realizes from its total investment in technology.

Create clear decision paths for setting priorities, coordinating IT services and approving

policies and standards.

Promote accountability by incorporating structured planning, linking IT decisions to

resource allocation decisions, empowering leaders to implement decisions and assessing

results.

Engage both IT and non-IT leaders from campuses, colleges and support units in decision-

making.

Be transparent and consistent. 29

Goals

30

IT governance is not an attempt to centralize decision-making or eliminate the

authority of distributed IT groups.

An important role of IT governance is to specify and legitimize the need for

distributed decision-making to maintain agility and support innovation.

Governance committees can’t possibly be sufficiently engaged to make all IT

decisions. Operational decision-making and many small to moderate sized

investment decisions will continue to be made by ITS, IT leaders, and their

budget executives.

The foundational priorities of IT governance are planning and coordination. In

order to maintain an effective service portfolio and optimize the use of our IT

resources, distributed IT groups and ITS need to more aware of each other’s

priorities and directions. The same is true among IT groups.

Governance groups will be focused on recommending goals and strategies

and prioritizing the most substantial investments that will have the broadest

impact on Penn State.

Where decisions have been made to adopt a common service, IT governance

will serve as a mechanism to create accountability for both the effective use

and provisioning of the service.

Principles

To maximize governance’s effectiveness Penn State should:

Focus IT governance on the University’s total IT investments and service portfolio, not

only ITS’.

Create a representative, executive level IT governance group comprised of senior

academic, administrative and IT leaders invested in understanding the complexities of IT

issues and decisions.

Charge governance structure with planning what needs to be done, prioritizing how to

do it and assessing the effectiveness of strategies and services.

Engage faculty, students and staff to determine the needs technology must meet and to

evaluate its performance.

Leverage the IT Leadership Council (ITLC) to bring together the University’s IT

community to share best practices, seek expertise and input to improve solutions, and

foster communication among IT units.

Empower the Vice Provost and CIO to facilitate the governance processes in a manner

that is transparent, consistent and efficient.

31

Key Actions

To improve IT governance, Penn State should adopt the model depicted on the following page.

Actions required to create the revised governance structures and processes include:

Designate the Provost, Senior Vice President for Finance and Business and the Vice Provost

and Chief Information Officer as the final decision-makers for IT.

Appoint an IT Board comprised of representative deans, chancellors, vice presidents and

senior IT leaders to approve strategic directions, approve IT policies, designate common IT

services and prioritize the most significant IT investments.

Empower the IT Board to oversee the development of a strategic IT plan for Penn State.

Appoint domain specific governance committees comprised of faculty, staff and IT

providers to identify emerging needs, recommend annual work priorities, recommend

standards, and sponsor university-wide improvement initiatives.

Appoint University-wide coordinating committees for IT architecture, security and

services to recommend standards, develop solutions and monitor the effectiveness of the

IT environment.

Establish the ITLC and the ITLC Board as a sounding board for major ITS decisions and a

coordinating body to foster collaboration among all IT units.

32

Proposed IT Governance Model

33

IT Board

Rese

arch

Ente

rprise

System

s

Instru

ctional

Tech

nolo

gy

Information Security

IT Architecture

IT Services

IT Governance In Practice

34

The IT Board will recommend long-range goals, endorse proposed IT strategies, recommend investment priorities, and sponsor the implementation of institutional policies and common services.

The IT Board will make recommendations to the Provost, Vice Provost for Information Technology and the Senior Vice President for Business and Finance.

The Board will invest sufficient time to understand the University’s technology issues and opportunities.

The Board will provide guidance to other governance committee’s to help them set annual work plans and priorities for the systems and services within their scope (e.g., enterprise systems, research computing, etc.).

The Board will be guided by analyses and recommendations developed by ITS leadership, ITLC working groups and other standing IT governance committees.

Governance committees for research, enterprise systems and instructional technology will recommend annual project priorities for common systems and services within their domain.

These domain specific governance committees will work with ITS to prioritize the use of existing resources to meet annual goals.

The committees will recommend new projects to the ITS leadership or the IT Board (depending on scale) to meet new need that are beyond the capacity of existing resources.

Committees will seek out opportunities to create new common services in areas where needs converge across the University.

IT Governance in Practice

35

The information security, IT architecture and IT services committees will focus on policies, standards and services that enable Penn State’s technology.

Committees will include both IT and non-IT leaders and will be co-led by an ITS senior staff member and a distributed IT leader.

The work of these committees will inform the development of policies and the adoption of technology standards.

The services committee will advise ITS and other providers of common IT services on the establishment and management of service levels and the selection of technologies integral to IT service management. The services committee will also recommend priorities to enhance services for which IT leaders play the equivalent role of functional leaders such as e-mail, storage and server hosting and virtualization.

For very significant decisions or changes, the committees will structure interactions with the ITLC to gain broader input from the Penn State IT community prior to making a final recommendation to ITS leadership.

Policy recommendations, recommendations to establish new common services, proposals to change how services are funded or projects that require substantial new investments that emerge from these committees will be reviewed by the IT Board.

Proposed Roles of IT Governance Committees

Group Membership Responsibility

Executive

Oversight

Provost, Senior VP F&B,

CIO

• Approve major investments, IT policies and multi-year IT plans

IT Board Academic and

Administrative VPs,

Deans, Chancellors and

faculty representatives,

ITLC representatives,

CIO and Deputy CIO

• Commission strategic planning

• Recommend multi-year IT goals and strategies

• Assess risks and commission the development of mitigation

strategies

• Approve and oversee the implementation of policy

• Approve prioritization of large projects

• Approve common services and recommend funding

mechanisms

• Review annual progress towards strategic goals

IT Leadership

Council (ITLC)

Campus and College IT

directors, ITS leaders

• Evaluate the performance of IT services

• Sponsor ad-hoc communities of interest around IT topics

• Assist with the development of IT policies, standards and best

practices

ITLC Board Elected by ITLC, CIO

(ex-officio)and Deputy

CIO (ex-officio)*

• Provide input to decisions impacting technology or services

that need to be made quickly or don’t require the input of all

of ITLC

• Recommend ITLC members to serve on segment specific

committees

• Commission ad-hoc communities to undertake special projects

and analyses 36

*Requires amending ITLC by-laws.

Proposed Roles of IT Governance Committees

Group Membership Responsibility

Faculty and Student

Advisory Committees

Faculty and Students • Provide input to long range goals and

strategies

• Advise on the development of policy

• Serve as a sounding board for any

significant changes to services or service

levels

• Assist with communications

Domain specific committees

(enterprise systems,

research computing,

instructional technology,

information security,

technical architecture, IT

services)

Faculty, administrative leaders,

ITS staff, campus and college

IT leaders (see individual

charges for details)

• Establish annual project priorities

• Recommend major projects and

investments

• Develop policies, recommend standards

and best practices

• Sponsor major projects

• Establish data definitions, standards

Ad-hoc Communities Appointed based on interest

and expertise by the Office of

the Vice Provost in

consultation with ITLC, faculty

and student advisory

committees.

• Provide input on future directions.

• Consider issues at the request of ITLC or

the Vice Provost.

• Research emerging needs or new

technologies.

• Share successful practices. 37

Attachment A

Description of the IT Snapshot Analysis and Glossary of Terms

38

Data Collection Method

Data was collected from all budget areas of the University. The only excluded entity is the Pennsylvania College of Technology.

Data was self-reported by individuals with knowledge of the IT operations and expenditures in each budget area.

Data collection was coordinated by liaisons selected by the budget executive.

Liaisons sub-divided their areas as necessary to facilitate data collection.

Expenditure and staffing data is a snapshot as of the end of FY09-10.

Staffing data was provided for any staff member that spends a quarter or more of their time managing technology or providing technology support.

Data collection was not limited only to those staff in job family 11.

The allocation of staff time by activity was captured in increments of .1 full time equivalents (FTE).

39

Glossary

Organizational Terms

Colleges – all University Park Colleges, Dickinson School of Law and the

College of Medicine

Campuses – all Commonwealth campuses and Great Valley

Academic Support Units – include ITS, Library, Global Programs,

Graduate School, World Campus, Research, Schreyer Honors College,

Undergraduate Education

Administrative Support Units – include Development and Alumni

Relations, Educational Equity, Student Affairs, Finance and Business,

Intercollegiate Athletics, Office of the President, and University Relations

40

Glossary

Activity Categories Academic Technology – includes consulting with faculty, supporting courseware and supporting

learning management systems

Applications – includes design, development and support of databases, web sites, reports and custom applications. Also includes operations and support of clinical management systems and custom and commercial administrative software packages. Finally, it includes support for communication and collaboration tools. This category excludes applications and databases directly in support of research projects.

Infrastructure – includes support for classroom technology, desktop and laptop computers, servers and portable media equipment. Also includes the provision and support of voice services,

wired and wireless networks. Research Computing – includes direct support provided to research grants. Activities include

support to develop custom research applications and the support for hardware and software dedicated to one or more research grants.

Security – includes provisioning access, responding to security breaches, scanning systems and security related training.

Support – includes training, troubleshooting and responding to questions from end users. Also includes researching emerging technologies and needs as well as providing user support for clinical systems and university-wide applications (e.g., IBIS).

Management – includes time spent managing IT staff, obtaining professional development, managing IT budgets, project management and IT leadership and strategy.

41

Glossary

Other Terms

FTE – full time equivalent staff

NPE – non-personnel expenditure - expenditures for technologies and

services excluding personnel salaries and benefits

Budget transfers – internal reallocation of funds from one University

budget to another as payment for services.

42

Attachment B

Select Data Charts from IT Snapshot

43

Total Technology Expenditures

Estimated Personnel Costs*

(salary and benefits)

$129,360,000

Non Personnel Expenditures $119,013,799

Total Expenditures** $248,373,799

44

*Assumes an average cost per FTE of $80,000

** Includes expenditures from auxiliary funds, restricted funds and internal budget transfers

Non-Personnel Expenditures by Area

45

Area

Total NPE Including Transfers and

Research Related Expenditures*

Academic Support Units $47,960,007

Penn State Hershey Clinical

Enterprise $27,705,741

Colleges $17,022,191

Administrative Support

Units $14,278,067

Campuses $12,047,793

Total $119,013,799

*FY09-10

Non-Personnel Expenditures (less budget transfers)

by Type

Break-down of Other

*Expenditures

Less Budget

Transfers

Depreciation $9,493,215

Services/contract labor $4,424,663

Networking and Telecom

Equipment $3,231,609

Access/Network

Connectivity $1,425,976

Hardware $1,406,162

Software $1,106,961

Other $900,000

Broadcast services/media $529,954

IT Operations and Supplies $233,890

Renovations/Facilities $207,415

Grad Assts $173,046

Course Development $158,150

Non IT Related $152,188

Video Equipt $57,500

Category

*Expenditures Less

Budget Transfers

Hardware $32,552,932

Software $26,445,395

Other Expenditures $23,500,730

Services $15,168,726

Research Expenditures $11,532,569

Initiatives $8,519,206

Total $117,719,557

46 *FY09-10

IT Effort (FTE)

133

441

356

67

50

388

178

0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500

Academic Technology

Applications

Infrastructure

Research Computing

Security

Support

Management

Includes finance, management,

HR, communications and

professional development.

ITS: 126

Clinical enterprise: 56

Colleges: 48

Admin support:78

Other Academic Support:109

47

IT Effort by Area and Function

48

55.6 0.0

20.1 45.0

0.6

231.5 78.3

18.0 53.7

56.2

166.2

25.4

53.6 81.6 24.1

22.8

0.5

2.2 38.1

0.7

16.2

6.6 9.6

14.5

2.4

154.0

40.9 44.9 70.4

60.6

154.6

15.6 11.3 25.9 16.1

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Academic Support Units Administrative Support

Units

Campuses Colleges Penn State Hershey -

Clinical Enterprise

Other (224)

Support (371)

Security (49)

Research Computing (64)

Infrastructure (351)

Applications (438)

Academic Technology (121)

IT Effort By Function and Area

49

55.6

231.5 166.2

22.8 16.2

154.0

154.6

0.0

78.3

25.4

0.5

6.6

40.9

15.6

20.1

18.0

53.6

2.2

9.6 44.9

11.3 45.0 53.7 81.6

38.1

14.5

70.4

25.9

0.6

56.2 24.1

0.7 2.4

60.6

16.1

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Academic

Technology

(121)

Applications

(438)

Infrastructure

(351)

Research

Computing

(64)

Security (49) Support (371) Other (224)

Penn State Hershey - Clinical Enterprise

Colleges

Campuses

Administrative Support Units

Academic Support Units

31.0% 37.4%

33.6%

69.0% 62.6%

66.4%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Consult with faculty Support courseware Support learning management

systems

Division of Effort - Academic Technology Total FTE - 132.6

ITS Effort

50

FTE – Academic Technology

51

Area/Activity ITS

Academic

Support

Without/ITS

Administrative

Support Units Campuses University

Park Colleges

Penn State

Hershey -

College of

Medicine

Penn State

Hershey –

Clinical

Enterprise Total - ALL

Consult with faculty 15.080 5.560 0.000 8.950 17.906 0.800 0.300 48.696

Support

courseware 13.490 2.860 0.000 6.550 12.707 0.300 0.200 36.107

Support learning

management

systems 12.250 6.330 0.000 4.540 12.952 0.300 0.100 36.472

Other- academic 0.400 9.020 0.000 0.400 1.500 0.000 0.000 11.320

Subtotal -

Academic

Technology 41.220 23.770 0.000 20.540 45.065 1.400 0.600 132.595

30.1%

17.1%

31.0%

16.0%

1.1%

11.9%

21.3%

62.1%

69.9%

82.9%

69.0%

84.0%

98.9%

88.1%

78.7%

37.9%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Design, develop

and support

databases

Design, develop

and support

websites

Develop custom

applications

[exclude

instruction and

research]

Develop custom

reports and

queries

Support area

specific clinical

management

systems

Support area

specific

communication

and

collaboration

tools

Support area

specific package

administrative

applications

Support

centralized

administrative

applications

within IBIS, ISIS,

eLion etc.

Division of Effort - Applications Total FTE – 440.7

Total: 45.6

ITS: 13.7

Academic support: 13.6

Admin support: 5.7

UP colleges: 5.4

Total: 84.9 FTE 52

FTE - Applications

53

Area/Activity ITS

Academic Support

Without/ITS

Administrative

Support Units Campuses University Park

Colleges

Penn State

Hershey - College

of Medicine

Penn State

Hershey –

Clinical


Design, develop and support databases 13.710 13.570 5.705 2.260 5.646 0.510 4.200 45.601

Design, develop and support websites 14.500 23.305 13.935 9.240 20.955 1.550 1.500 84.985

Develop custom applications [exclude instruction and research] 23.720 20.480 20.480 1.151 6.200 0.100 4.300 76.431

Develop custom reports and queries 7.540 12.290 10.790 1.060 4.280 0.100 11.200 47.260

Support area specific clinical management systems 0.200 0.050 0.390 0.070 0.471 0.660 16.000 17.841

Support area specific communication and collaboration tools 2.640 1.570 5.730 1.821 4.666 1.800 3.900 22.127

Support area specific package administrative applications 13.320 12.610 16.885 1.621 4.526 0.310 13.400 62.672

Support centralized administrative applications within IBIS, ISIS, eLion etc. 50.160 21.815 4.410 0.737 1.799 0.100 1.700 80.721

Other - Application 3.100 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 3.100

Subtotal - Applications 125.790 108.790 78.325 17.960 48.543 5.130 56.200 440.738

4.6% 13.3%

49.6%

3.7%

53.4% 44.0%

95.4% 86.7%

50.4%

96.3%

46.6% 56.0%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Maintain

classroom

technology

Maintain

desktops, laptops

and PDA's

Maintain Servers Support portable

multi-media

equipment

Support voice

service

Support wired

and wireless

network

connectivity

Division of Effort within IT - Infrastructure

Total FTE – 355.9

Total FTE 88.6 Total FTE: 129

ITS: 64

Acad support: 18.6

UP Colleges: 18.2

Admin support: 9.9

Commonwealth campuses 8.3

Total FTE: 63.7

ITS: 28

UP colleges: 8

Clinical Enterprise: 7.8

Campuses: 7.5

54

FTE - Infrastructure

55

Area/Activity ITS

Academic

Support

Without/ITS

Administrative


Park Colleges

Penn State

Hershey -

College of

Medicine

Penn State

Hershey –

Clinical


Maintain classroom technology 1.150 2.470 0.140 12.680 7.269 0.700 0.400 24.809

Maintain desktops, laptops and PDA's 11.785 13.660 9.600 15.830 32.252 2.600 2.900 88.627

Maintain Servers 63.990 18.640 9.940 8.320 18.607 2.800 6.300 128.997

Support portable multi-media equipment 0.510 1.790 1.160 4.545 4.168 0.700 0.800 13.673

Support voice service 16.600 1.480 0.440 4.031 0.552 2.100 5.900 31.103

Support wired and wireless network connectivity 28.060 6.090 4.090 7.830 8.274 1.600 7.800 63.744

Other - Infrastructure 8.500 -3.900 0.000 0.000 0.350 0.000 0.000 4.950

Subtotal - Infrastructure 130.595 40.230 25.370 53.236 71.472 10.500 24.100 355.903

4.8% 0.1%

9.3%

95.2% 99.9%

90.7%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Direct support for research grants -

develop research computing applications

Direct support for research grants -

hardware, IT equipment

Support research computing - general

Division of Effort - Research Computing

Total FTE - 66.9

56

FTE – Research Computing

57

Area/Activity ITS

Academic

Support

Without/ITS

Administrative

Support Units Campuses

University

Park

Colleges

Penn State

Hershey -

College of

Medicine

Penn State

Hershey –

Clinical


Direct support for research grants - develop research computing applications 1.200 3.000 0.300 0.110 11.491 8.500 0.300 24.901

Direct support for research grants - hardware, IT equipment 0.010 10.550 0.000 0.802 6.015 1.470 0.000 18.847

Support research computing - general 1.900 6.120 0.150 1.303 9.499 1.100 0.400 20.472

Other research 2.200 0.200 0.000 0.000 0.300 0.000 0.000 2.700

Subtotal - Research Computing 5.310 19.870 0.450 2.215 27.305 11.070 0.700 66.920

9.2%

28.8% 22.2%

13.1%

90.8%

71.2% 77.8%

86.9%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Provisioning Access [e.g. ASRs] Respond to security breaches Scan vulnerabilities Training

Division of Effort - Security

Total FTE: 49.7

Total FTE: 18.5

ITS: 4.1

UP colleges: 5.1

Campuses 3.6

Total FTE: 13.9

UP Colleges: 3.9

Campuses: 2.1

Total FTE 10.5

58

FTE - Security

59

Area/Activity ITS

Academic

Support

Without/ITS

Administrativ

e Support

Units Campuses University

Park Colleges

Penn State

Hershey -

College of

Medicine

Penn State

Hershey –

Clinical


Provisioning Access [e.g. ASRs] 0.970 1.365 1.665 1.760 1.733 1.200 1.800 10.493

Respond to security breaches 4.025 1.605 1.450 2.220 4.014 0.350 0.300 13.964

Scan vulnerabilities 4.095 2.295 2.690 3.850 5.402 0.050 0.100 18.482

Training 0.830 1.020 0.840 1.730 1.708 0.000 0.200 6.328

Other- security 0.000 0.000 0.500 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.500

Subtotal - Security 9.920 6.285 6.645 10.060 12.857 1.600 2.400 49.767

25.9%

41.9%

0.0%

47.2%

15.5% 22.2%

74.1%

58.1%

100.0%

52.8%

84.5% 77.8%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Answer user

questions

Research emerging

technologies and

needs

Support clinical

management systems

Support University-

wide applications

[e.g., ISIS, IBIS. eLion]

Train end users Troubleshoot end

user issues

Division of Effort - Support

Total FTE: 388.1

Total FTE: 149.3 Total FTE 87

ITS: 22.5

Academic support: 14

Admin support: 9.7

Campuses: 10.6

Colleges: 14.6


Total FTE: 37.7

ITS: 17.8

Academic support: 4.0

Admin support: 3.0


Total FTE 48.5

60

FTE- Support

61

Area/Activity ITS

Academic

Support

Without/ITS

Administrative


Park Colleges

Penn State

Hershey -

College of

Medicine

Penn State

Hershey –

Clinical


Answer user questions 22.570 14.080 9.740 11.210 15.285 2.000 12.100 86.985

Research emerging technologies and needs 20.320 8.540 3.850 5.870 8.512 0.650 0.800 48.542

Support clinical management systems 0.150 0.880 0.110 0.447 0.000 10.800 12.387

Support University-wide applications [e.g., ISIS, IBIS. eLion] 17.815 4.010 3.020 4.510 4.081 0.700 3.600 37.736

Train end users 5.560 6.410 9.135 4.830 6.512 0.450 2.900 35.797

Troubleshoot end user issues 33.210 21.360 14.250 18.350 25.591 6.200 30.400 149.361

Other - support 5.550 8.080 0.250 0.700 2.720 0.000 0.000 17.300

Subtotal - Support 105.025 62.630 41.125 45.580 63.148 10.000 60.600 388.108

Attachment C

Detailed Discussion of Improvement Opportunities

62

Email/Calendaring

Context • 56% of budget areas use the ITS calendar solution

and 62% use the ITS email solution for at least some

of their faculty and staff

• 40% of budget units operate multiple solutions for

calendar and email – Approximately 30 discrete, non-

ITS solutions are operated..

• Approximately 22 FTE support email and calendaring

solutions University wide*.

Proposal • Deploy a single email and calendaring solution for

faculty and staff.

• Continue to support individuals’ choice of “client” on

their devices to read email and maintain calendars

(e.g., Outlook, iCal).

*All data as of FY10. Source: IT Assessment data collection. 63

Email/Calendar

Investments $4.3 million investment over five+ years. Includes $1.5 million in

one-time funding and $625,000 in recurring annual funding.

Anticipated

benefits

Cost Savings

Cost Avoidance

Productivity

Reduced risk

Internal

Benchmarks

• Excluding Hershey, there are approximately 15 units running

independent installations of Exchange for 5,100 users.

• F&B estimated a total cost of ownership of $55 per mailbox per

year (excluding staff time) to run Exchange for its users.

• An estimated 15 additional units are running open source or

other forms of email with limited annual cost.

• Small scale, open source implementations are estimated to cost

$10,000 every four years to refresh hardware.

64

Email/Calendar

Category Explanation of Benefits

Cost Savings Retire legacy Exchange solutions in 13 units – estimated savings $55 per user@5100

users - $280,000

Retire legacy open source and small email applications – estimated savings of $2,500

per year per implementation@15 implementations -$38,000.

Cost Avoidance Repurposing of email servers as legacy systems are retired may delay or eliminate

some future purchases.

Productivity Significant new capabilities provided to faculty, students and staff.

Significant potential to limit the time required to schedule meetings and events.

2 to 3 ITS FTE can be redeployed to support the common solution at full

implementation.

Retiring local email solutions could free the equivalent up 1 to 2 FTE of productivity

across local IT staff, assuming a 10% savings across 19 FTE.

Reduced risk Single email solution improves compliance with record retention policies and

significantly reduces the effort to comply with e-discovery requests.

65

Long-term Storage, Archiving &

Management

Context • Data storage and archiving is currently a highly distributed service.

In fact, 78% of budget executive areas manage some type of storage

service on their own.

• 52% of budget areas use an ITS service for part of their storage

requirements.

• 60% of areas operate multiple types of storage services to meet

different needs.

• There is no service to support the long-term data preservation and

management required as part of research data management plans.

Proposal • Design and deploy a common solution for long-term data storage,

archiving and management.

• Designate preferred paths that link options for near-term and

medium term storage to the long-term archive.

• Develop preferred solutions and guidelines for locally attached

storage.

66

Long-term Storage, Archiving &

Management

Investments Benchmarks suggest to expect an initial investment of at least

$500,000 with significant recurring requirements to expand

storage and deliver data management services.

Anticipated benefits Cost Savings NA

Cost Avoidance

Productivity

Reduced risk

Benchmarks • Initial estimates suggest that each research intensive college

would spend at least $100,000 to address long-term archiving

acting on their own. This estimates does not include

providing services to curate the data.

67

Long-term Storage, Archiving & Management


Cost Savings As a new service, no new cost savings would be created.

Cost Avoidance The economies of scale for hardware and the ability to share expertise to curate

data make a shared solution much less expensive than each area investing on their

own.

Absent a University initiative, research intensive colleges anticipate spending

$500,000 to $1,000,000 collectively in the next year to meet current needs for

research data archiving.

Productivity Small gains in productivity will be realized through centrally managed storage

infrastructure.

Reduced risk Without a solution, Penn State risks the loss of important research data and the

potential of being out of compliance with sponsor requirements.

68

Expanded Support for Virtualization and Co-

location

Context • Approximately 50% of budget exec areas use an ITS

service for at least some of their co-location and

virtualization support.

• Nearly 60% of budget exec areas use multiple sources of

services (ITS, one or more parts of their organization, third

parties).

• 129 FTE are devoted to activities related to maintaining

servers

• 32 of 52 reporting areas provide virtualization services.

Proposal • Expand the current capacity to offer colocation and

virtualization services as a University service.

• Adjust cost models to offer more competitive pricing.

• Begin by consolidating servers within ITS and other

administrative areas requiring high availability locally.

69


location

Investments Initial investment of $160,000 to renew capacity, reduce the cost

to PSU units and provide geographic redundancy.

Anticipated benefits Cost Savings

Cost Avoidance

Productivity

Reduced risk

Benchmarks • Unit level efforts to virtualize servers vary. Admissions

estimates that it has an annual cost of $25,000 (including 8%

of an FTE)

• F&B estimates that its six major divisions spent

approximately $175,000 in one year for disaster recovery

planning

70


location


Cost Savings Small annual savings will be created by avoiding duplicate purchases of hardware and

software to support server virtualization.

Assuming 13 major academic and administrative support units spend at least

$25,000 per year on such purchases, the annual savings could exceed $250,000.

Additional savings from improved power utilization by consolidating data centers is

not included in this estimate.

Cost Avoidance Virtualization and co-location will enable budget executive areas to retire servers,

back-up power supplies and other hardware associated with maintaining small data

centers/server rooms.

Productivity Could free up 5% to 10% of an FTE in each budget executive area maintaining there

own server rooms or small data centers. Across all of Penn State, this could free up

the equivalent of six to twelve FTE to be redeployed to other priorities – 10%

savings across 129 FTE engaged in managing servers.

Reduced risk Critical administrative systems would be consolidated in fewer, high availability data

centers with appropriate redundancy.

71

Support: Expanded Client Management

Context • Supporting end users occupies over 200 IT staff FTE across PSU.

• Supporting classroom technology occupies 21 FTE outside of

ITS.

• 37 of 52 budget areas use TEM (“Big Fix”) to manage the

desktops in labs or classrooms. TEM makes It more efficient to

distribute software, troubleshoot and manage the power

utilization of computers.

• Many but not all campuses utilize an ITS service (CLM) to

manage computer labs. Adoption of the ITS service is lower

among UP colleges.

• Areas that have adopted the CLM service, have realized

significant reductions in support workloads that can be

redeployed other priorities.

Proposal • Extend the ITS managed lab service (CLM) to all labs and

classrooms.

• Pilot and then adopt a similar centrally managed service for

administrative staff computers.

72

Support: Extend Client Management

Investments TBD


Cost Avoidance

Productivity

Reduced risk

Benchmarks Units that have deployed CLM have experienced significant gains

in productivity.

• Altoona – reduced staff working on labs by 50% 4 to 2 FTE

• Harrisburg – re-deployed 2FTE to higher priorities

• Chemistry and Biology and Molecular Biology – reduced time

required to build machines by 50%

• OPP estimates that the use of TEM in conjunction with the

CLM service has generated $500,000 in annual savings from

reduced power consumption.

73

Support: Extend Client Management


Cost Savings OPP estimates the University could realize an additional $150,000 in annual savings

from improved power management.

Cost Avoidance Significant productivity gains enable IT units to take on additional workload without

adding as many additional staff.

Productivity Assuming CLM serves half of the current labs and that adoption creates a 50%

increase in productivity, the equivalent of 5.5 FTE of staff savings could be created

by completing the deployment to all labs.

If a similar service is made available for administrative desktops, significant

productivity increases could be generated for the 200 FTE engaged in support.

Reduced risk A centrally managed service such as CLM would reduce vulnerability from out of

date spam and anti-virus software or incorrect security settings.

74

Support: License Management

Context •The University spends approximately $27

million in general funds annually for academic,

clinical, general productivity and business

software.

•A portion of this expenditure is for software

licensed to individual computers that is used

infrequently.

Proposal •Extend the use of server based software

licenses by adding additional software products

and increasing the number of budget exec areas

participating in the program.

75


Investments TBD


Cost Avoidance NA

Productivity

Reduced risk NA

Benchmarks •Delivering popular packages such as the Adobe suite via a

server reduces the cost of the software by 50% or more.

76



Cost Savings Historical reductions in software costs have been significant. More analysis is

required to quantify the magnitude of the opportunity, but additional substantial

savings should be possible by increasing the use of server based software licenses

for labs and desktop computers.

Cost Avoidance There is no future cost avoidance associated with this initiative.

Productivity More standard software versions in use should simplify support.

Reduced risk There is no risk reduction associates with this initiative.

77

Support: Shared Service Desk System

Context • Supporting end users occupies over 200 IT

staff FTE across PSU.

• 25 of 52 budget units maintain one or more

call centers to handle IT service requests

and questions.

• Handoffs of issues between support

organizations are inefficient.

• Support organizations lack a mechanism to

share best practices.

Proposal • Deploy a common ticketing system and

knowledge base that can be accessed or

used by all IT support organizations at Penn

State. 78


Investments TBD


Cost Avoidance

Productivity

Reduced risk NA

Exemplars of Benefits •Efficiency and service improvements for problems that engage

more than one IT organization to resolve.

•Better coordination, more consistent quality and practice

among IT support staff.

•Better data and analytical capacity to spot issues and trends in

problems.

79



Cost Savings There are no immediate cost savings associated with this initiative.

Cost Avoidance The availability of a common service desk solution would enable some IT units to

retire or avoid implementing there own ticketing systems. While exact data is not

available, the annual cost of these smaller help desk systems is not believed to be

large.

Productivity An improved knowledge base and integrated ticketing system will have meaningful

impact on IT staff members’ productivity. Even a 10% improvement in productivity

spread over 200 FTE providing support would create 20 FTE of staff savings that

could be redeployed to higher priorities.

Reduced risk There is no risk reduction associates with this initiative.

80

Wireless as a Common Good

Context • 64 FTE including 28 FTE within ITS support

wired and wireless networks.

• Approximately 33 units provide and manage

their own wireless networks.

• An estimated 4.5 million gross square foot of

University buildings (excludes ARL and

Auxiliaries) lack wireless coverage.

Proposal • Provide wireless as a common good available

consistently across the University.

• Provide flexibility to units to enhance the

capacity of their wireless and have some local

control over network management.

81


Investments $1.9 million to provide coverage to areas without wireless today.

Assumes all areas without coverage will require it.


Cost Avoidance

Productivity

Reduced risk

Exemplars of Benefits •Estimated $70,000 in annual recurring savings from future

purchases of network controllers.

•Units that have transferred responsibility for wireless to TNS

report minor staff savings that they have allocated to higher

priorities.

•Significant strategic value to providing a consistent wireless

experience to the Penn State community.

82



Cost Savings There are no immediate cost savings associated with this initiative.

Cost Avoidance The adoption of standard wireless equipment will create an estimated $70,000 in

recurring future cost savings from the reduced cost of equipment.

Productivity Based on the results of colleges that have participated in the TNS service to manage

wireless, some productivity gains will be realized. Presently UP colleges and

administrative units invest 13 FTE collectively in managing wired and wireless

networks.

Reduced risk Will create more consistent wireless security.

83

Attachment D

Proposed IT Governance Committee Charges

84

IT Board

Membership Meeting Frequency

Standing members: Vice Provost and CIO,

Deputy CIO, Chair of ITLC and Vice Chair of

ITLC, Chair of FACAC, Chair of STAC

Appointed by Provost: 2 College Deans, 3 Vice

Presidents, 2 Chancellors

Quarterly including one extended planning

retreat

Responsibility Decision-Rights

• Sponsor/guide long-range IT planning

• Monitor the effectiveness of IT investments

• Assess risk and commission mitigation

strategies

• Sponsor policy development

• Advise the executive oversight committee

on IT investment priorities

• Maintain an effective balance of distributed

and common IT services

• Approve an annual IT investment portfolio

• Recommend major new investments in

technology

• Approve IT policies (subject to Executive

Oversight Committee review)

• Approve common services and funding

mechanisms (subject to Executive Oversight

Committee review)

85

ITLC Board


Elected by ITLC members

Vice Provost and CIO (ex-officio)

Deputy CIO (ex-officio)*

Monthly


• Establish ITLC goals and agenda

• Facilitate consistent communication with/among the

broader IT community through the ITLC

• Identify in consultation with the Office of the Vice

Provost issues that require discussion by the ITLC

• Recommend participants in ad-hoc communities of

interest

• Advise the Office of the Vice Provost and the IT

Board on decisions with University-wide impact

• Monitor major changes proposed by instructional

technology, research computing and enterprise

systems committees and brief the ITLC as necessary.

• Appoint ITLC sub-committees

• Appoint ITLC representatives to ad-hoc

communities of interest

• Approve changes to IT policy (subject to IT

board and Executive Oversight concurrence)

• Approve new common services (subject to IT

board and Executive Oversight concurrence)

• Approve changes to IT standards, service

levels and sourcing strategies (with the

concurrence of the Vice Provost and CIO)

86 *Requires change in ITLC by-laws.

Enterprise Systems – Business, HR and Research*


Appointed by the Vice Provost and CIO in

consultation with the Senior Vice Presidents for

Research and Business and Finance

Monthly


• Recommend strategic direction for enterprise

applications

• Oversee significant IT and business process

change projects

• Align IT investments and projects with functional

unit goals and priorities

• Establish and manage an annual work plan for AIS

and functional area technical resources

• Approve an annual work plan for systems and

process improvement projects

• Approve re-prioritization of existing workload

when new needs arise

• Approve strategies to resolve resource conflicts

between functional and technical units

collaborating on IT projects

• Recommend major initiatives to enhance or

replace existing systems that are too large to

accomplish within the annual work plan

87 *SIS and Data/Analytics committees will have similar responsibilities and decision rights

Research Computing Committee*

88


Appointed by the Vice Provost and CIO and the Vice

Provost for Research

Quarterly


• Recommend strategic directions for research

computing

• Monitor the implementation of major initiatives to

improve research computing infrastructure and

services

• Identify gaps in research computing capabilities

and services

• Advise research computing organizations on the

design of services and solutions

• Advise ITS, ITLC and the IT board on the optimal

division of research computing support between

common and distributed solutions

• Support efforts to communicate with the research

community

• Recommend projects and investments to improve

research computing infrastructure.

• Recommend annual priorities to improve existing

capabilities.

• Inform the development of policies and standards

that could impact researchers.

• Inform decisions regarding the creation of

common services to support research and

researchers.

* Instructional technology committee will have similar responsibilities and decision rights

Information Security Committee

89


Appointed by the IT Board in consultation with the

Vice Provost and CIO and the Executive Committee

of ITLC.

Quarterly


• Monitor emerging threats to information security.

• Design policies and practices to mitigate

information security risks at the request of the IT

Board.

• Provide input to the ISO on the development of

enterprise security services and the deployment

of enterprise security technologies.

• Sponsor communications, training and other

events to raise awareness.

• Recommend IT policies, standards and practices.

• Recommend strategies to implement IT policies

and standards adopted by the IT Board.

• Inform decisions regarding the adoption of

security technologies.

• Inform the design of communications, training and

awareness raising campaigns.

IT Services Committee

90


Appointed by the Vice Provost and CIO and the

Executive Committee of ITLC. Includes ITS staff,

campus, college and administrative unit IT leaders.

Monthly


• Scope of interest includes enterprise technologies,

technology as a service (e.g., storage) and IT

support services.

• Assist with the development of strategies for IT

services.

• Identify emerging needs for new services and new

opportunities to create common services.

• Advise on the establishment or modification of

service levels for common services.

• Provide input to the design of technology and

technology service solutions.

• Provide input to the development of technology

standards.

• Sponsor initiatives that promote collaboration

among colleges, campuses and administrative

units.

• Recommend projects and investments to improve

IT services.

• Recommend the establishment of new common

or distributed services.

• Inform decisions about the design and

implementation of common services.

• Recommend policies, practices and standards that

enable the improvement of IT services.

• Recommend corrective actions to improve

services.

Technical Architecture Committee

91


Appointed by the Vice Provost and CIO and the

Executive Committee of ITLC. Includes ITS staff,

campus, college and administrative unit IT leaders.

Quarterly


• Provide input to the University’s long-range

technical direction.

• Advise on the adoption of enterprise-wide

technologies and standards.

• Review emerging technologies.

• Recommend technical standards.

• Recommend guidelines that establish boundaries

between enterprise and unit specific technology

adoption decisions.

• Inform decisions regarding the timing and

adoption of new technologies.

it assessment executive summary.pdf

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