Dodds

Suppose someone told you five years ago that soon everyone walking across campus would be talking on a phone. You might have accepted that, but would you have believed that some of the phones would be talking back and giving advice?

Yogi Berra was right: We can't always predict the future. So the Office of Information Technologies just hopes to shape it, by laying out an IT Strategic Plan for what IT at Cornell should be like in 2017.

Ted Dodds, vice president for information technologies and chief information officer, has recruited an advisory group, including deans, vice presidents and outside experts, to guide the planning, with working groups focusing on four areas: Teaching and Learning, Research and Scholarship, the Student Experience and IT Service Excellence. They will draw on previous Cornell work such as the Reimagining Cornell initiative and the report of an external review of Cornell IT conducted in June 2011.

But we all have a voice. "This is the very first campuswide IT strategic planning initiative," said Steve Schuster, associate CIO. "Before, we tended to focus on central IT services. Here we're really focusing on end users, asking, 'What do you need from IT?'" That, in fact, will be the first of a summerlong series of Questions of the Week, posted in several locations in the Cornell Web space, including CUINFO, PawPrint and the IT Horizon blog at http://blogs.cornell.edu/ithorizon.

The blog also invites comments on working drafts of the four working groups. They will post work in progress, Schuster said, so the community can watch the development and even help inform and steer it.

A conference for stakeholders, "The Future of IT@Cornell, 2013-2017," is planned for Sept. 11. "We need more than just the input of IT professionals," Schuster said. "We really want to involve faculty and students in this event."

The strategic plan will be built on seven "framing principles":

• The role of information technology at Cornell is to advance the academic mission of the university through our faculty, students and staff.
• All IT staff should have the skills necessary to succeed in their roles, and to enable excellence in teaching and learning, research and scholarship, the student experience, and administrative functions.
• All IT staff should actively seek opportunities to leverage the benefits of technological or process innovations that meet -- or anticipate -- the needs of the university community.
• IT systems and services should be selected and delivered in a highly collaborative (central and local) model. The central IT organization must ensure that all IT "utility" services and infrastructure (e.g., email, desktop management, networking, etc.) meet the needs of the community, and function effectively. IT Service Groups can then address the specialized needs of their local end users, particularly in support of core academic activities.
• Except where explicitly prohibited, or restricted by legislation or policy, utility IT services and infrastructure should be accessible, and work seamlessly, in all Cornell locations.
• Utility services should be used by all units, and not duplicated. If centrally provided utility services cannot meet the needs of local units, collaborative efforts should be made to avoid having to replicate the service locally.
• The IT Strategic Plan should state a clear adoption strategy (early/mainstream/late) in all major technology domains.