A project to reform information technology governance at UC Berkeley was halted in September after campus officials began integrating the project with the office of the campus’s chief information officer.
The IT Governance project – originally part of the campus’s controversial cost-cutting initiative Operational Excellence – was put on hold because project leaders felt that an interim officer would not be able to oversee the project’s long-term strategic planning, according to Liz Marsh, program manager for the project.
Lyle Nevel, the campus’s interim associate vice chancellor for information technology and chief information officer, was appointed in April after his predecessor, Shelton Waggener – who laid the foundation for the governance initiative – stepped down. Campus administrators expect to announce a permanent replacement in December and will restart the project once that person takes office.
The decision to move the project away from the Operational Excellence program to the office of the CIO was based on findings that indicated a need to integrate the design of information technology governance across campus departments, Marsh said in an email.
She added that moving the project to the office of the CIO would allow members of the project to engage in discussions evaluating funding models, infrastructure standards, program management and the development of a highly efficient system with other members of the office staff.
“IT governance transcends organization to encourage synergies,” Marsh said in the email. “These mechanisms must not only be considered together in the development of an IT governance model, but also support a campus strategy.
The project began in March with an initial six-month budget of $368,000 and will be funded partly by the CIO’s office. While no direct savings are projected as an outcome of this project, a more efficient IT service is expected to help the campus cut costs in other administrative areas.
Once it is implemented, the initiative will consolidate and streamline IT governance across the campus departments and colleges.
“Today we don’t have anything we could call an IT governance model,” Marsh said. “There are many areas where government is working, but we don’t have anything in place that provides a structure and alignment for all of these activities.”
Justin Abraham covers academics and administration. Contact him at [email protected].
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The problem is the existence of the CIO position. CIOs charged with creating a new or cheaper infrastructure feel obligated to find a homegrown solution rather than investigate shifting most of the computing to the Cloud. I want Cal’s own students to learn to build and run a data center, but if saving money is imperative then the CIO has to consider Cloud services.
The whole enterprise of OE is retarded. Paper savings only–if you want a service to exist on campus, it will be paid for one way or another.
And moving the IT employees 2 miles off campus to a rented location on 4th Street is pure fucktardery.
good news