Meeting Minutes
Monday, April 4, 2011
Present: Greg Alt, Andrea Ballinger (via conference call), Robert Blemler, Khris Clevenger, Matt Helm (via conference call), Dan Holland, Judy Johnson, Scott Johnson, Jill Jones, Larry Lyons, Brent Paterson, Liz Rivas, Wendy Smith, Deb Smitley, Mark Walbert
Absent: Barb Blake, Chuck McGuire, Jonathan Rosenthal, Dane Ward
Welcome and Introductions. Members present introduced themselves; Andrea Ballinger and Matthew Helm participated via teleconference.
Organizational Matters. Members briefly discussed the composition of the Council, appointment terms, a website for the Council and meeting planning.
Review and Discussion of Vice President’s Charge to the Council and Council’s Objectives. The Council will provide oversight of IT activities on campus; identify priorities; oversee data access; establish performance metrics and monitor progress. The Council will look at measurements such as return on value, total cost of ownership, and strategic directions in establishing priority among various project requests. The initial, immediate task is to define standards for a Master Data Access Plan, including definitions of various access levels and formalization of a review process.
Andrea Ballinger noted that since her arrival she has encountered very little logic and documentation related to data access. This is acceptable for a small institution, but the risk is great for the large institution ISU has become. Auditors have discovered these same issues. We need to put together a plan that will allow the access needed for job duties while protecting the data. Deb Smitley mentioned that Andrea’s team has made good progress in determining who has access to what. She also noted that iPeople may serve as a model for us.
Judy Johnson asked whether the Council’s oversight of IT activities on campus with extend to purchases as well. The Council will cover broad oversight of the users of IT or enterprise IT. The Tech Council will continue to provide oversight of purchases.
Information Technology at Illinois State: Governance. A background document from Garner on IT governance was reviewed briefly. Deb Smitley explained that ISU is moving to a supply and demand governance structure for oversight of Enterprise IT, a structure recommended by Garner and others. Other institutions are using this model. The Data Stewardship and IT Services Council will be serving on the demand side by prioritizing among the various technology needs brought to the Council; it will also develop a master data access plan. The IT Policy and Planning Council chooses which products will be purchased, develops policies and procedures, and is responsible for long-range planning.
Information Technology at Illinois State: Overview of the IT organizations within the University. Mark Walbert shared an organizational chart from July 2010. This gives a general idea of where all the principal players are although there have been some changes. Some sections now report to Andrea Ballinger. Student Affairs IT has been organized from three separate groups into one. Athletics receives service from Enterprise Systems Support (Administrative Technologies). Facilities Management needs to be moved under ESS.
Andrea reported that Administrative Technologies consists of three main divisions (Business Intelligence Solutions, Enterprise Systems Support and eMerge). Administrative Technologies serves the Division of Finance and Planning, University Advancement and Intercollegiate Athletics. They take care of hardware/software, desktop, and all operational enterprise systems.
Deb noted that while it is decentralized, Mark and Andrea meet quite frequently. One group to mention is the Common IT Solutions Group made up of members from the directors’ level. This group might dovetail nicely and work with the Council well.
Wendy Smith asked whether the goal is to make sure there is no redundancy or to create a more centralized system. Deb said the focus is primarily on identifying business needs/the IT needs of the business units or enterprise IT needs. It is not so much about redundancy in structure but about prioritizing projects and needs. They also hope to use the structure in place to identify and communicate about activities that could be used as solutions across various projects.
Mark noted that the Stewardship Council will develop security policies that will be implemented in a way that is auditable and traceable. This will provide a framework on the IT side for how we will deal with security issues. This group will also determine what is considered highly sensitive and what is public information. Wendy Smith said it would be useful to see the list of procedures especially as the policy is at such a high level.
IT Strategic Plan 2011-2013 (copy available at: http://www.ctsg.ilstu.edu/committees/Council/governance/it-strategic-plan-122210.pdf). Mark shared copies of a draft of a new IT Strategic Plan; the draft is scheduled to receive final review by the IT Policy and Planning Council Monday. This is the second time a campus wide IT plan has been done. The primary goal is to support Educating Illinois. They have reformatted the vision statement and core values to match up with Educating Illinois. Each core value applies to all IT staff which is a major change for this addition. They are also coming up with a timeline and cost related to various priorities this time around. They have a much better focus now to bring to the vice presidents. Another point Mark highlighted is the fact that Goal 3 is specifically related to how IT is organized on campus and to finding ways for IT staff to work together collaboratively. This Council will help accomplish this goal. Deb asked where you see the Stewardship Council in the plan. The name is not used. Deb believes at minimum the plan should recognize the existence of the Council. Jill Jones agreed that this would be the perfect opportunity to drive home the importance of the work.
Other Matters. Scott Johnson noted that the full name of the Council was not used on the graph on the mission and charge page. He suggested consistent use of the name at all times.
1