Introduction What an IT strategy is An IT strategy is a process that organization goes through to identify and define a portfolio of projects that will help your organization achieve strategic In order for the strategy to be successful, these projects must be staffed and budgeted. Otherwise, it's a nice report that sits on the shelf while the organization continues to allocate its IT resources in an ad hoc and reactive manner. It is important, then, that the IT strategy feed into the districts formal budget process. Process We assembled representatives from all the colleges and most of the functional areas. The team met monthly starting in September and culminated its work in early January. Using the district's overall strategic goals as a reference, identify problems and shortcomings with the districts existing IT capability that would constrain the district from meeting its strategic goals. The workgroup felt that the shortcomings could be organized into 5 themes: Institutional ability to deliver The overall lack of project management skills in the district has resulted in either projects failing or else expensive consultants hired to drive projects to completion. IT governance, the process by which decisions are made and standards are established, has been weak at best. The district does not have well-defined and established IT processes. Instead, IT services are demanded and delivered in an ad hoc, uncoordinated fashion, resulting in unhappy customers and overworked, demoralized IT staff. There are big holes in the IT skill sets necessary to support PeopleSoft. The District PeopleSoft team is understaffed, and does not have the range of skill sets necessary to support even day-to-day maintenance of the system, much less implement new modules and functionality, resulting in a heavier reliance on consultants. Sustainable IT infrastructure Tech refresh (that is, the set of processes and policies that ensures that an organization renews its technology infrastructure and maintains an adequate level to support its business operation) is ad hoc and unplanned. It is highly dependent on bond and other, one time funding sources. There is a highly uneven distribution of IT capability not only between the colleges and the district office, but also within the colleges themselves.
Users to be supported 100 1,300 28,000 $281,700 Annual cost of hosted web based email $6,000 MS $0 Google $78,000 MS $0 Google $0 MS $0 Google $84,000 MS $0 Google Annual cost of email $33,000 $249,000 $0 $282,000 Annual savings by category $27,000 MS $33,000 Google $171,000 MS $249,000 Google $0 $198,000 MS $282,000 Google 1st year 2nd year 3rd year Annual net savings (assumes an implementation cost of $100,000) $98,000 MS $182,000 Google $198,000 MS $282,000 Google $198,000 MS $282,000 Google Cumulative savings $98,000 MS $182,000 Google $296,000 MS $464,000 Google $494,000 MS $746,000 Google Sources of Risk: The primary sources of risk are the risk of migrating the current mailboxes to new environment and change management risk associated with users moving to a new Resource Constraints: None. Interdependencies: None. 2.9 Sustainable IT Infrastructure: Upgrade to PeopleSoft ver. 9.1 Opportunity:
Evaluate whether commercial systems can be cost effectively implemented that meet the specific needs of Peralta. If yes, budget and acquire. If no, budget and custom develop the system. Discussion: The current paper-based system suffers the same problems common to all paper-based systems: Failure to use the paper form as required. Loss or delay of the form during the preparation and review/approval process. Use of inaccurate information and codes on the form with the assumption that reviewers or processors down-stream of the originator will discover and correct these errors, which typically does not happen. An electronic system similar to Peralta’s previous electronic PA system will resolve these problems by integrating workflow and validation of codes and data entered before the form reaches the HR and Payroll systems. Hard benefits include: Reduction in manpower required to correct data or rework processes driven by the data. Reduction in errors requiring correction will reduce time to close the financials each month resulting in more timely and accurate financial data required to run the district. Reduction in the manpower required to originate the form and carry it from approver to approver, and eliminate any mid-process copies that may be made in order to create a history and control record. Soft benefits include: Fewer late or inaccurate pay warrants for employees. Environmentally friendly elimination of paper copies. A full historical record of all actions that is auditable and can be used as a statistical data source to further improve the process. From the November 2010 study we know that PA forms are greatly delayed which in many cases means that the instructor did not receive pay in the first month that it was due. From the study: The PAs generated for adjunct assignments (for restricted fund and non-instructional assignments) are manually carried along an approval routing that typically involves six stops on campus and 10 additional stops in the District Office. However, the degree of attention they receive varies widely from campus to campus and since the PeopleSoft system recognizes an obligation to pay after the third campus stop with the scheduler, there is reason to question the necessity of the additional 13 stops. Total processing time on campus averaged 23 days (random sample of 63 PAs, not all prorata but all from fund 11 or 30), and an average of 53 days campus and district office
Sources of Risk: Risk is judged to be medium for an outside contractor implementing a PS module. Resource Constraints: None. Interdependencies: The implementation schedule for any PS module is dependent on the decision regarding if and when to conduct the PS upgrade to 9.1 discussed in a separate project. This project is a likely precursor to eProcurement. 3.7 Reduce Back Office Cost: Student Financial Aid System Opportunity: The current Student Financial Aid System (SAFE) is a mainframe product run on our existing mainframe. Peralta is the last remaining client for this 3rd party mainframe system by ESI and all annual update costs now fall on Peralta only, rapidly escalating our costs. The prospects for ESI maintaining this system over the long term (at a reasonable cost) are poor. Also the hardware on which we run the system is well past its lifespan and even programming support must come from Peralta retirees whose willingness and ability to continue in this role is questionable. Peralta already owns the PeopleSoft Student Financial Aid module and should implement it. There are design problems with the delivered module that we will need to engage PeopleSoft to overcome, but they have already given us assurances that this can be done. This project has high up-front costs but much lower long term support costs and maintaining the current system is not a reasonable option. Recommended Actions: Engage PeopleSoft to conduct a detailed evaluation of the modifications needed to fully meet Peralta’s needs and a detailed implementation plan which can be used as a planning guide to the project. Determine whether the work should be wholly or partially led by PeopleSoft of whether it should be bid out to other integration vendors. Budget, schedule, implement. Discussion: Any new system will need to be scheduled to go live on January 1, the beginning of a new application year. The existing ESI SAFE system must operate in parallel to complete the processing of the existing year for at least an additional 9 months.
Budget, schedule, implement. Discussion: None. Investment: The cost of a technical solution to automate live streaming of instruction is estimated to be $100,000 per college, or $400,000 three year cumulative cost. Summary of Net Benefits: Benefit level is believed to be medium. 1st year 2nd year 3rd year Quantifiable savings not estimated not estimated not estimated Expected investment $400,000 $0 $0 Annual net savings (cost) ($400,000) $0 $0 Cumulative savings (cost) ($400,000) ($400,000) ($400,000) Sources of Risk: Medium. Resource Constraints: None. Interdependencies: None. 5.3 Mobile Learning: Mobile Templates for PeopleSoft/Passport Opportunity: Some universities have found it valuable to give faculty and students access to PeopleSoft content via mobile devices in areas such as registering for classes, schedule look-ups, doing grade checks, and ad hoc drops/adds. Rather than simply shrink a web site to the size of a mobile screen, the preferred solution is to develop web templates (html5) specifically to optimize the information and interaction on a 320 X 240 mobile device screen.