OIIT Computing Conference
Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Chancellor Erroll B. Davis Jr.
Rock Eagle 4-H Center Auditorium
Eatonton, Georgia
Thank you, Tom. As you will hear shortly, I talk a lot about enhancing performance. Tom took me at my word. He brought me out here to this idyllic spot and has made me work — three speeches back-to-back. I did the first one at 11:00 a.m. This one feels like the afternoon service!
So the next time I see one of those ubiquitous emails from OIIT talking about an outage here or servers down there and know that some of you are working overtime or on the weekend, let me say, “I feel your pain.” None of us have the power to make that pain go completely away — it comes with the awesome responsibility each of you have of managing technology for a large and complex system. But I do empathize.
I’m an engineer by training — an electrical engineer with a lot of work in computer design and engineering. So I understand what it means when Tom Maier told me his wife calls this annual computing conference, held out in the woods by a lake, “Nerdstock.”
After nine months on the job, I’ve addressed a number of System groups. Some of these groups meet on our campuses. Some meet in places like St. Simon’s. But the computing folks come to a 4-H camp. You’ve done this — I understand willingly — for 35 years! That’s truly amazing. Particularly when I understand that what I’m seeing is a much-improved version after major renovations.
What does this factoid tell me about you? It tells me that you are a dedicated group. It tells me that you are committed to what you do and to the University System. And I appreciate what you do and the way in which you do it. It tells me that you take seriously the need to come together and discuss the challenges, accomplishments, and issues facing the System and the world of technology. And it tells me that after the speeches are over and the daily seminars done — you don’t have to worry about anyone calling the police when you unwind out here under the stars.
As you may know, I’ve visited all 35 of our campuses, many more than once. I’ve met with presidents, faculty, staff, students, community leaders, and legislators. As I’ve made the transition from the energy sector to higher education, I’ve likened my education to being force-fed by a fire hose.
But I have retained some of the things I’ve learned. And I know that — hidden away among the pines and cabins — Rock Eagle has a robust fiber-optic network. How many 4-H camps in the country can boast of that? That is both a testament to the vision of our IT group and the true explanation of why you return here for your annual computing conference.
You go where the technology allows you to connect and stay connected. And that can be a metaphor for our strategic picture. As we look to the future of higher education and the University System of Georgia, we must ensure we have in place the technology that allows our customers to connect and stay connected. That’s true whether someone is on one of our campuses, in a business or at home anywhere in the world.
This is a huge challenge, and part and parcel of a larger and newer challenge that the University System faces — to educate a much higher percentage of our population to a much higher level than in the past. To be successful in that venture, we need sound leadership supported by a sound structure — and technology is perhaps the central support for that structure.
My job as chancellor is to create the context and environment and ensure you have the tools to enable us to meet this challenge. So with that, let me discuss some of the ways in which we are working to create that context and to ensure you needed resources. To begin let me go back to my comment regarding our challenge in education. Then I will touch upon some of the approaches we are taking to address this challenge.
As many of you are well aware, the United States faces many challenges in preparing its citizens for productive roles in a fast-changing, interconnected world. While the U.S. has long enjoyed a deserved reputation for its higher education system, today other nations have taken note and are educating more of their citizens to more advanced levels. This is a key finding of the recent report of a commission appointed by U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings.
We have remained so far ahead of the competition for so long, that we may have taken our postsecondary education superiority for granted. This attitude is costly. It is self-serving. It will lead to failure. Two-thirds of high growth jobs require a college degree, which only one-third of Americans have.
But in Georgia, too many citizens lack a high school diploma, much less a college degree. Last week the Atlanta Journal Constitution in an editorial noted that the new Toyo tire plant had to turn away two-thirds of the applicants because they either lacked a high school diploma or failed a background check. I would suggest that these two are related. Georgia cannot compete globally with a population ill-prepared educationally.
And just as the US may be guilty of coasting on past success in our higher education system, we must also examine the degree to which we have coasted when it comes to technological expertise. Again, while much of our gains in knowledge and productivity in recent decades have been driven by our edge in technology, the rest of the world is catching up. As Thomas Friedman has pointed out in his best seller, “The World is Flat,” the US can no longer take its edge for granted.
Ironically, the very technologies that have given us an edge in IT and communication also allows more players to compete on an equal footing. So, another challenge we face — and a responsibility we have — in higher education — is to regain our momentum and lead in technology. We must do this because technology drives so much of our overall processes.
For example, a recent audit of the University System’s OIIT functions shows that fully 70 percent of our technology resources and budget directly supports our teaching, research and service mission. Only 30 percent supports back office operations.
Technology truly plays a central role in the education of our students. Our challenge is to reinvent and reshape the culture of higher education to help Georgia and the nation remain globally competitive. And because of the central role of technology — each of you will be key to our success in meeting this challenge.
So, what are we doing about it? My working model is that a quality organization begins with quality people. If we are going to be successful in meeting the mission of the System and the state’s needs, we must have the right leaders in place.
Please understand — when I say “leaders” I don’t mean just our institutional presidents. Quality leadership must exist at every level of the organization. They must be nurtured, trained, and grown. And we must have individuals who truly aspire to leadership — not to administration, not to bureaucracy, but to leadership.
There is a difference between managing and leading. Managers do it right — leaders do the right thing. The technology area offers unique opportunities for leadership because of its ability to level the playing field and remove barriers to entry.
Look at some of the biggest advances in technology use in recent years — Yahoo, Google, MySpace, YouTube. These are successful because they allow individuals to connect with resources, with other technology, and with one another. And they were not created by large, well-established companies. Individuals made these a reality. Individuals who were not afraid to take risks and fail time and time again. That’s leadership.
Each of you has the power through technology to create new avenues for connection and for education. For example, here in the University System, we have created eCore, BSAT, WebCore — we need to continue to push the boundaries of distance education. We need to establish a greater market presence, a greater leadership presence. But you must believe that you have the power of leadership to take the risk and examine the possibilities. Again, my job is to create a culture or a context in which you have this freedom and opportunity.
Creating this climate begins with our presidents. We have streamlined the reporting lines of presidents to provide stronger leadership to this group and to create opportunities for increased interaction, support and learning. We also are taking steps to increase the managerial breadth and responsibilities of our presidents.
Over the past months, we have identified approximately 70 key areas where we believe we need to be better across the System. These have been narrowed down to an initial 10 and each has been assigned to a president. Five of these — if not more — have technology implications:
- improving enrollment management and planning;
- broadening nursing education;
- enhancing student advising;
- enhancing emergency preparedness/business continuity planning; and
- improving capabilities related to energy management and cost efficiencies.
Eventually, all 35 presidents will have a system level assignment. The end result will not be a series of studies.
Presidents must drive outcomes that are measurable across the system. We are engaging our presidents in a leadership development exercise that will challenge them to lead not just vertically, but also horizontally. This process will encourage presidents to think more of the System and how to strengthen our outcomes at all 35 institutions.
It is another way of achieving on a broad scale what you do at this conference by bringing together people from different institutions and organizations with different responsibilities to think about and discuss the larger issues. You are, in fact, creating a System context with this conference. That is my goal with these System-level projects.
One of this System’s great strengths and advantages is that it is a System — the state constitution created a structure that is somewhat unique in higher education. But, I’ve found that we don’t often act or think like a System. We tend to act and operate more as a confederation.
So much of our current changes are designed to create a culture in which we truly act and think as a System — in which institutional aspirations are aligned with System goals. We need to change a culture in which people believe: “there’s a hole in your end of the boat — you ought to fix that.” I encourage you to take the attitudes and outlook fostered in this conference and apply them to any involvement you may have in our System-level projects. When you do — you will be providing sound leadership.
Our customer service efforts — part of Governor Perdue’s statewide initiative — also serve to help us to think in terms of meeting needs as contrasted with simply bragging about our own success. Our customer service effort boils down to a single, straightforward question we need to continually ask ourselves — and have every person in the System ask: “Why would you NOT want to improve?” or: “Why would you not want to be better?”
This Customer Service effort is important to me. We would be engaged in a continuous improvement exercise like this even if the Governor had not launched a state-level initiative. It’s a tool that will help us take our existing “pockets” of excellence to a uniform level of excellence across the system. Systemic excellence, not just individual excellence, is the goal here. And technology will play a key role in achieving that goal.
You are in a position on the front lines to identify processes than need to be and can be changed. And many of you interface directly with our customers. As I look at the projects so far, it is clear to me that we need more direct application of technology to our customer service initiatives. Of the 35 campus customer service projects — only one — at Georgia Southwestern — deals directly with technology. I suggest we have an opportunity — and a need — to create additional opportunities for technology to play a role in our customer service efforts.
We also are looking ahead strategically to implementing Lean Six Sigma throughout the University System. Now for those of you unfamiliar with Lean Six Sigma, let me provide the following insight: Lean Six Sigma is already an informal practice in the System. You are already doing it! For example, the good work that has been done in the IT area to consolidate processes such as PeopleSoft and Banner are examples of Lean Six Sigma in action.
IT has moved aggressively to improve efficiencies in our processes. The challenge is to extend these efficiencies in the ways we work with our customers. My goal is to create a permanent culture of continuous process improvement, rigorous metrics and high standards.
Another area where you will see significant change is in the budget area. Here, I want to address a culture that too often looks at funding and budgets as entitlements. There are no entitlements — funding must be justified and it must produce measurable results. And we will align our budget with our identified priorities. If we say something is a priority, then we will fund it. If we don’t fund them, they are not priorities.
All of these changes I have discussed are related and inter-related, whether it is a change in organizational structure, whether it is the creation of leadership opportunities for presidents and on down in the organization, whether it is a new focus on customer service or whether it relates to our use of budgets. All should take place in the context of ensuring that the University System of Georgia is harnessing its resources on behalf of the state.
And to do that in the most efficient and effective manner possible requires us to think and act as a System. Your insights, experience and knowledge will, of course, provide the crucial spark to transform plans to action. I encourage each of you to take full advantage of the unique opportunity this conference provides to better connect with those in this room.
You may have very different backgrounds and responsibilities, but you all share a passion to create and sustain the technology that supports and drives the academy. I would urge you to take those cross-institutional connections and keep enlarging the circle. We need each of you to provide the leadership for others in the University System to also learn that we are all in the same boat. There cannot be a hole in your end of the boat without affecting us all.
Finally, it is very important that we not let the daily pressures and responsibilities of our tasks blind us to why we are here. What we do is about students and the transformative power of education. We have a new slogan we are fine-tuning: “The University System of Georgia — Transform your Life, Power your Potential.” First time out!
If you want to see transformation, I strongly recommend the best way to reconnect with our customers — to recharge your personal passion for your work in the University System — is to attend a graduation ceremony at one of our two-year colleges. There you will truly see the transformative power of education. When you leave that ceremony, there will be no doubt in your mind of why you dedicate your time and talents to higher education and the University System of Georgia.
I will leave you with one last thought on leadership. Leaders intervene. Leaders shape and change the future. Despite the constraints of time, place and resources, never forget the admonition from the Terminator movies: “The future is not set. There is no fate but what we make for ourselves.”
Thank you for your dedication and your efforts. And thank you for listening today. Now, I’ll take a few questions.