1. CIOs in Wonderland: Transformational Leadership for Interesting Times
Hilary Baker Michael Berman John Charles Amir Dabirian
California State University

2. Copyright California State University 2010
Copyright California State University This work is the intellectual property of the authors. Permission is granted for this material to be shared for non-commercial, educational purposes, provided that this copyright statement appears on the reproduced materials and notice is given that the copying is by permission of the authors. To disseminate otherwise or to republish requires written permission from the authors.

3. Now...it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place.

4. California State University
Largest 4-year higher education institution in US
San Jose State campus est. 1857
Channel Islands campus est. 2002

5. California State University
Bakersfield
Channel Islands
Chico
Dominguez Hills
Fresno
Fullerton
Hayward
Humboldt
Long Beach
Los Angeles
Maritime Academy
Monterey Bay
Northridge
Pomona
Sacramento
San Bernardino
San Diego
San Francisco
San Jose
San Luis Obispo
San Marcos
Sonoma
Stanislaus
Chancellor’s Office

6. California State University
400,000+ Students
44,000 Faculty & Staff

7. Driving Factors for Change–The New Normal
CA Budget
Emergence of cloud based services, web 2.0 and virtualization
Created new opportunities to rethinking radically the ways that we provide services to students, faculty and staff
CSU CIOs decided to work together synergistically!

8. CSU CIO Call to Action Above campus Transformational
Campus-led/governed
“Coalition of the willing”
. . .Called “Synergy” Initiatives 8

9. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.

10. Synergy Initiatives

11. Virtual Information Security Center
Goal
Share Information Security services across campuses
Timeline
Pilot - Spring 2010
Production – July 2010

12. Regional Data Centers Goal
Identify data center cost savings and efficiencies
Timeline
Proof of concept with 1 campus - March 2010
CSU data center inventory - Nov 2010

13. Virtual Network Operations Center
Goal
Network monitoring and management
Timeline
Pilot Spring 2010
Production Fall 2010

14. Virtual Computer Labs Goal
Provide virtual application lab services to CSU campuses eliminating need for physical labs
Timeline
Pilot - Spring 2010
Expanded Pilot - Fall 2010

15. Synergy Learning Management Services
Goal
Implement a more cost effective way to provide IT support for teaching and learning
Timeline
LMS Governance - Fall 2010

16. ...it's no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.

17. Synergy Project Outcomes: Some moved quickly
Some moved forward quickly & achieved early wins for the participating campuses
Virtual Information Security Center (VISC)
Virtual Computing Labs (VCL)
Regional Data Centers (RDC)

18. Synergy Project Outcomes: Some just now taking off
Some had slower starts & are now beginning to show results
Virtual Network Operations Center (VNOC)
Synergy Learning Management Services (LMS)

19. Synergy Project Outcomes: Some stalled
Some stalled out within months
Synergy Procurement
Synergy Help Desk

20. What’s Next? Moving Beyond the CSU Walls
CENIC brokered or hosted “above campus” IT services
VCL-Cloud Services
VoIP Services
Data Center Services
CIO synergy collaborations with CFOs & CAOs
Procurement (Revisited)
Community college transfer pathways

21. Alice had learnt several things of this sort in her lessons…

22. Lessons Learned: ROI Return on Investment (ROI), but…
Low initial investment
Risk aversion
Executive-ready
Greenfield factor
Ease of governance = faster action

23. Lessons Learned: Collaboration
Recognize realities of existing structures
Really, only two kinds of collaboration:
Voluntary shared benefit
Forced march
Exhortation without motivation or coercion has little impact

24. Lessons Learned: IT as driver vs. follower
Big payoff: business process consolidation
IT synergies can enable business synergies
Shared Business Services
Options for students
Mobility
Online options 24

25. Lessons Learned: Campus Cultures
Respect local campus culture and organizations
Every project is not for everyone
One size may not fit all
Easier to deploy pilots and proof of concepts to demonstrate value 25

26. Lessons Learned: Political Barriers
Loss of control/autonomy
Risk-averse culture
Difficulty conceiving how it could work
Accepting the new normal = giving up
Cost savings vs. cost avoidance
Lots of excuses to do nothing 26

27. Discussion

28. Acknowledgements
Thanks to Lewis Carroll and John Tenniel for their brilliant work,
to Gettysburg College Library for preserving and sharing it,
and the Internet Archive (archive.org) for making it freely available to the world.