Impact of the Information Technology Profession Copyright 1991 CAUSE From _CAUSE/EFFECT_ Volume 14, Number 1, Spring 1991. Permission to copy or disseminate all or part of this material is granted provided that the copies are not made or distributed for commercial advantage, the CAUSE copyright and its dateappear, and notice is given that copying is by permission of CAUSE, the association for managing and using information resources in higher education. To disseminate otherwise, or to republish, requires written permission. For further information, contact CAUSE, 4840 Pearl East Circle, Suite 302E, Boulder, CO 80301, 303-449-4430, e-mail info@CAUSE.colorado.edu IMPACT OF THE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY PROFESSION by Thomas W. West ABSTRACT: At the 1990 CAUSE National Conference, CAUSE presented the first ELITE Award for Exemplary Leadership and Information Technology Excellence to honor an outstanding professional in the field of information technology management in higher education. Award winner Thomas W. West addressed more than 1,000 information technology administrators during the luncheon at which he was recognized. This article is a record of his remarks on that occasion. I am deeply moved and flattered to have been chosen to receive the first CAUSE ELITE Award. Whatever successes I have had as a higher education administrator over the past thirty-one years, including nearly eighteen in the arena of information resources and technology, have been the direct result of the outstanding teachers, mentors, professional colleagues, and staff with whom I have had the pleasure to be associated. The long and short of it is that I have been very lucky. To make my remarks more than just words of thanks to the many people who have contributed to my professional growth and development, the CAUSE Recognition Committee suggested that I reflect on the impact that the information technology profession has had on higher education and will have in the future. If you will bear with me, I would like to do that from a very personal perspective, namely, what impact the profession has had on me over the past eighteen years and what my vision of the future portends for the profession. As an information technology manager, I view myself as a first- generation professional. I am part of a group of general administrators in higher education who were thrown into this arena from outside the fields of data processing and computing science because our presidents wanted someone to translate the technical jargon into English. In 1973, as a result of a task force report, Indiana University's president, John Ryan, asked me to become the first University Director of Information and Computer Services for that multi-campus system. My first mentors were two people who should be very familiar to you. Ernie Jones, this year's CAUSE Conference Chairperson, was the Director of Data Systems and Services at IU at that time. Al LeDuc, Director of Computer Services at Miami-Dade Community College and a long-time active contributor to CAUSE, was the chief planner for our comprehensive Indiana University Management Information System. They can tell you how naive and inexperienced I was during those years. Starting at IU, all that I have ever brought to my roles as an information resources manager are two genetically-rooted behavioral characteristics and one mental skill. My behavioral attributes include: * Optimism: when others see insurmountable obstacles, I see opportunities. * Tenacity: I don't like to lose and will persist until I win-- something. My only mental skill is my spatial ability. I tend to see and can conceptualize new relationships, especially organizational ones, that will enable an institution to deal with a problem or to reorder itself at a new and higher level of action. All the other behavioral attributes, skills, and techniques that I have employed over the past eighteen years have been learned. Let me tell you some of the things I have learned. These might be called the "West Axioms for Information Resources Management." Authority/Control #1 Wield Influence Assume a position of influence. If you wait for someone to give you authority commensurate with your perceived responsibilities, it will never happen. President Ryan, prior to my assuming the responsibilities for information resources management at Indiana, once said to me "Go over to that office and find out what is going on and make the right things happen. Oh, by the way, I am not putting you in charge or giving you any authority, just make it happen." From that experience, I learned that influence, not authority, is the key to management. Communications #2 Tell All to All It is impossible to keep secrets in colleges and universities. My advice is to be open and to communicate widely. Otherwise, you will forget who you told and who you did not tell. We employed this tell-all- to-all technique at CSU during a major administrative systems planning effort that was going to result in a major procurement. We told the vendors everything we knew up to the moment. In fact, we had a designated spokesperson. #3 Use the Informal/Gossip Network If you want something to be known in your organization in the shortest time possible, let the grapevine know about it. If used properly, it is a great mechanism. Project Management #4 Employ Inverse Parkinson's Law Collapse your project to fit the time allotted and at the same time increase your organization's productivity. #5 Abolish the Traditional Project Management Cycle In the 1990s the traditional project management cycle will not work. Eliminate defining requirements. Start by setting a due date of not more than a year away. Assemble a team of the users' and your staff. Lock them up and give them 30 days to produce a prototype. I didn't realize it then, but in 1978 we did that very thing when we developed our Financial Aids Management System in cooperation with Information Associates. We gave a team six weeks to come up with a prototype design. As a result of that six weeks effort, in nine months we were able to produce the first modules of the Financial Aids Management System, a product that has been marketed by Information Associates ever since. The same thing occurred at CSU in 1981 when a team of six modified and installed IA's Financial Accounting System at nineteen campuses and the Chancellor's Office in less than one year. Decision-making #6 Make Decisions Decisively As my senior professor, August Eberle, once told me: "You should be able to make 50 percent of your decisions correctly by a mere flip of a coin. If you have any intelligence, you should be able to discern which ones you might make incorrectly and make 50 percent of those correctly. Three out of four is a very good batting average in any league." #7 Give Ownership Freely to Others For the ideas and results of any project or decision, give others the credit. They probably deserve it more than you think. People Management #8 Respect the Power of the Lower Participant He or she who controls information or the access to information or access to people with information has power. Respect that power and respect those people at all times. I learned that lesson very early, during my days at Thiel College. Strategic Planning #9 Focus on the Individual Bob Heterick and Ken King taught me that the Copernican model (people) of planning was more appropriate than the Ptolemaic model (technology). The goal of the information resources management program should be to increase the intellectual productivity and effectiveness of the faculty, students, and staff. All planning must focus on that goal. #10 Use a Common Framework It is important that all the participants in the institution have a common lens through which to look at the future. At the 1988 CAUSE National Conference, I presented what I called the "West Cube," a three- dimensional framework to depict the information resources management function in higher education.[1] That framework has evolved over the years. It had its roots in a conceptual framework I first saw Ed Shaw, formerly at Stanford, present in the early 1980s. #11 Understand Your Institution's Culture Know well the wealth quotient, the locus of decision-making, the leadership style, and the mission of your institution. Make sure the information resources and technology program is responsive to that culture. #12 Emphasize Adaptive Planning Strategic planning is a process of development, implementation, and evaluation. All facets go on at the same time. In the development phase, you must recognize what is routine planning, what might need contingency planning because of uncertainty, and what might need opportunistic planning. Change Management #13 Be an Agent of Change Being part of change is quite different from being an agent of change. To be a change agent, you must be willing to take risks, even lose your job. #14 Make Change for Change's Sake In spite of Machiavelli's observations, whether you think it needs it or not, to avoid hardening of the categories and fossilization of your professional staff, reorder the organization and reassign the activities of personnel periodically. It is easier to reassign existing human resources than to constantly deal with staff turnover. Remember, information technologists resist change as much as anyone, if not more so. Crisis Management #15 Under-react As one of my directors, Ray Clark, always says, do not over-react to a perceived crisis. Given a bit of time, 80 percent of the issue may go away. Personal Growth and Development #16 Learn from the Best and Learn with the Rest Always identify the best in your field and try to learn from them. However, never ignore the rest because many ideas are always emerging from the depths of the profession. How did I learn these things? In essence as an information resources manager, I have been like the cowboy in the "old West" who learned from other cowboys on the job, at the annual round-ups and rodeos, and through brief encounters on the trail. Because I had no true counterpart in the Big 10, Ernie Jones first introduced me to CAUSE in 1976. Later, I was introduced to EDUCOM and still later to the Snowmass Seminars on Academic Computing. These conferences, like the cowboy round-ups, gave me an opportunity to get away to swap stories, share ideas, hear some words of wisdom, and to relax and rest before going back to the grind of managing the next cycle of activity. Such professional development was adequate for those of us who were part of the first generation. Unfortunately, it will not be sufficient for the future. I believe we are at a very significant turning point in the evolution of the information resources and technology function in higher education. Over the next decade we have the opportunity--no, a necessity-- to pull together the information resources services--academic computing, administrative systems, telecommunications (video, voice, and data), library, media, instructional development, reprographics, and institutional research--into a cohesive and comprehensive campus-wide function. The key to our being successful at such integration rests on the availability of professionals equipped to assume the overall leadership role at each institution. To develop the necessary leadership and professionalism for the future, two things must happen. First, CAUSE and the other professional groups in this arena, such as EDUCOM, must move towards more formal programs of professional development. Second, HEIRA, the Higher Education Information Resources Alliance, recently created by CAUSE and EDUCOM, must be expanded to encompass the library, telecommunications, media, and instructional technology groups, to provide a national and all-encompassing forum for collaborative and coordinated efforts to move us towards the maturation of this major function within universities and colleges. A primary focus of HEIRA should be on the professional development of the thousands of individuals in the field to prepare them to cross the existing organizational and professional boundaries which inhibit such maturation. That is my vision. At some later date, I hope to elaborate. In closing, let me say that the 1990s hold great promise. Resources are going to be scarce, user demands are going to increase, and the technology will become more complex. I think our motto for the nineties ought to be "more with considerably less." Wow! What an opportunity! Finally, my thanks to the CAUSE Recognition Committee and the CAUSE members. My most sincere thanks to ELITE Award sponsor Information Associates and IA President John Geraci for the scholarship award. It affords me an opportunity I otherwise might never have had to acknowledge the contributions that many people at three institutions-- Thiel College, Indiana University, and the California State University System--have made to my personal and professional growth and development. I am especially grateful for the contribution that will go to the IU School of Education in the memory of Professor Emeritus August W. Eberle, my senior professor and friend, who died last month. He contributed so much to so many. Thank you all very much! ************************************************************************ Thomas W. West is Assistant Vice Chancellor, Information Resources and Technology, for the California State University system. In this position he is responsible for strategic planning, coordination, implementation, and management of the information resources management program (computing, instructional technology, telecommunications, library, and media) for this 20-campus, 360,000-student, $2 billion a year educational system. Before joining CSU, West directed the information and computer services function at the Indiana University System. Earlier in his career, he held a number of positions including instructor of mathematics, assistant development director, vice chancellor for administration, and college president. He earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics from Thiel College, an M.Ed. in counseling from Westminster College, and an Ed.D. in higher education administration from Indiana University. West has served on the boards of both CAUSE and EDUCOM as well as national committees, been a frequent speaker at national conferences, and published heavily in the field of information technology management. He played key roles in the execution of the IBM California Education Partnership, development of EDUCOM's Networking and Telecommunications Task Force and the EDUCOM Software Initiative (now the EUIT program), and formation of the Coalition for Networked Information by the Association of Research Libraries, CAUSE, and EDUCOM. Tom West's belief in the importance of information technology to higher education has been the hallmark of his career. His commitment and dedication to the profession, and to the visionary goals of the profession, earned him recognition as the winner of the 1990 CAUSE ELITE Award. The award, which is sponsored by Information Associates, includes a $5,000 contribution in West's name to be divided among scholarship funds at Thiel College, Indiana University, and the California State University Foundation. ======================================================================== Footnote 1 See Thomas W. West, "Gaining Acceptance for an IRM Program," in Information Technology--Can It All Fit? Proceedings of the Current Issues Forum of the 1988 CAUSE National Conference, CAUSE Professional Paper Series #2 (Boulder, Colo.: CAUSE, 1989), pp. 12-15. ========================================================================