Dec 2013 notes

Posted by Carlyn Foshee Chatfieldon December 13, 2013

How to get internal IT communications flowing and keep them flowing?

Carlyn - Rice U: How are you onboarding new employees? How do you get them on the right mailing lists, org chart, etc?

Lisa - U Toronto Libraries - We use a buddy system for the first month. We match up new employees with volunteer buddies who can help direct the new hires (where's the bathroom, where is the documentation, how do I get added to relevant meetings, etc.?)

Julie - Boston College: We have the new hires self-subscribe to lists (give them lists that apply to their role).

Lisa - U Albany: Are you using a wiki for a knowledge management tool?

Almost everyone: Yes.

Lisa - U Albany: What about the people who feel their data is not share-able?

Carlyn - Rice U: Once we adopted Confluence, and the group who used it first was our infrastructure team, that initial group showed us how to lock down pages like this:

• 1. Only IT employees

  2. Only IT employees on specific teams

  3. Only IT employees on specific team in a sub group

  4. Only IT employees named in that page permissions.

The permissions in Confluence spaces can only be reduced, not expanded. So you can't create a page in an IT-only space and try to open it "up" to the public.

• • Boston College uses multiple spaces and permissions change between those spaces, including IT-only.

  • U Oregon also uses Confluence, only available to ITS employees, which causes conflicts across the university sometimes, but by opening up our spaces to other ITS teams we were able to break down some of the silos.

How to make the wiki a "killer app" so that IT employees WANT to use it? Try different carrots such as free football tickets that can only be claimed via wiki participation.

Lisa - U Albany: Anyone who is faculty or staff can request a wiki space. We can use as teaching tools, sandboxes, working spaces on projects or communications that are not yet ready for prime time.

Julie - Boston College: we have two instances of Confluence, the IT-only spaces and the university public space and our faculty and staff can and do use that space like U Albany described.

Carlyn - Rice U: we use Confluence the same way as Albany and Boston.

What are the other tools you use for improving internal IT communications?

Lisa - Toronto: ITIS started information sharing sessions, I call them lunch and learns where we can gather small teams around to discuss or hear a casual presentation. It is very organic, if a topic comes up in a standing meeting, we might take it further in the lunch and learn.

Lisa - U Albany: we also use Tech Talks, but they are more formal, held once a month, Fridays 2-3pm. We've had high success with that, have been using for 1.5 years now. For several months, we would focus on a different overall IT goal. It allowed people to learn more about projects they were not necessarily involved in. This year, we are a little more casual about our topics, but it can be a challenge to coax presenters. Our crowd ranges 25-50+ out of an overall group of 110 or so.

Carlyn - Rice U: we also use Lunch and Learns, particularly if a new project is being implemented.

What about social events?

Lisa - U Albany: We have a couple of events each year, our division is spread out in different buildings. But we found that even though people don't necessarily know each other, if we don't have a color coded seating assignment or a table assignment activity, our groups still sit with the people they already know. We found that if we force it, we hear grumbling in the beginning, but people later come up to us and thank us for providing an opportunity to get to know other staff.

Julie - Boston College: We also have a group of volunteers from different teams creating the "town hall" style meeting led by our CIO each year. A group of 230, and it works. Seating assignments can be random, by geographic location (share commute routes, etc). Table assignment - tell 2 truths and a lie about yourself at each table and have the other table people guess which one.

Lisa - U Albany: how do people get on that committee and do they have guidelines?

Julie - Boston C: A couple of managers that work for the VP remain on the committee all the team but they don't try to influence a strict set of guidelines other than each meeting has to have an external speaker (and the suggested names are provided). In a 2-hour time block, the meeting does provide time to both hear a speaker and spend time talking about hot buttons or key projects, and still use the team building activities. We also do online feedback after each of the meetings. These feedback surveys also have an invitation to volunteer. If not enough volunteers, then the managers that remain on the committee may reach out to specific people. One of the teams wanted to use different bits of music between activities, one team wanted a slide show, the teams really enjoy planning and working together.

Kerri - U Georgia: The Leadership Council for all ITIS is a weekly meeting that is open to everyone who wants to listen. Policy changes, personnel changes, new projects, etc. You can come in and talk about what your team is working on, there are both agenda items and table discussions or announcements. Max 1 hour, Max 40 people, limited by physical space. Have talked about a Blackboard Collaborate session, sometimes hard to hear if the speaker is in the middle of the room. We also have a change management group that meets once a week.

Carlyn - Rice: We use change control, 3 short meetings every week, to communicate changes to systems.

Along those same lines, we have a guest speaker for the January Coffee Shop: Communicating Change Management, by UC Boulder.

Gina - Case Western: We are using electronic newsletters - less than two pages, short blurbs the CIO can use to report to the Provost and President, the day after the P/P letter goes out, it is shared inside ITS. We are trying to get beyond the perception that we are an Internet and email provider. Shifting ideas about IT throughout the community, starting at the top. (Everyone asked for a copy! will send to IT Comm list). We started a semester review, and then asked, why are we doing this only once a semester? We went to a quarterly report to the deans. ONCE. Then the CIO requested I make it a weekly document. The President and Provost can share with whom they deam appropriate. Then I share it with everyone in ITS. We're moving to a new content management tool and we're trying to NOT add more pages to the old site.

Where do you get the info and decide what goes on the newsletter?

We've only been doing this since November and it is a huge investment of time right now. We have a call for submission inside ITS, and I also walk into people's offices. When I hear stats, I say, "oh, that is something we really need to get out to the campus."