Thanks for attending our all-team Operations & Infrastructure meeting today. I also appreciate that everyone was very attentive and asked great questions!
Some have asked for a copy of today's slides, so I thought I'd post them here. Download file.
I promise our next all-team meeting will be a larger room (probably room 140 or 142.) The meeting room today was a little small for the size of our group.
Just wanted to remind everyone of our all-team meeting next week. Please join me on Wednesday, March 25 at 2:00 for our first Operations & Infrastructure team meeting. We will meet in room 538, WBOB. Topics covered at the meeting will be:
There will be time at the end for some Q&A, but please understand that I will not be able to answer the "OIA" questions. Those should be left for Doug at the next all-OIA meeting.
I hope you will be able to attend. If you are not on vacation or have an appointment, I will see you there.
Thanks!
Borrowing from the IT Leaders Program that I was in, I thought I'd pass this along. As you saw in Steve's emails this week, the U is under a very tight budget.
It's a stressful time, I know. Unfortunately, I don't expect to have any answers until May, but we still have a lot of work to get done before then. It's important not to lose sight of our mission to OIT and to the University. Our goals haven't changed in light of the budget problems. In fact, my overall goals of Simplify, Standardize, Automate will become even more important over the next few months.
You may wonder how to work through these difficult times. I like this advice from a fellow ITLP'er, recommending you ask yourself these 6 questions:
Please, be open with your managers. If you have a particular concern or worry, talk to your manager. Or, come find me; I will find time to have a chat with you.
I've previously written about maintaining a work-life balance. I'd like to talk about this again.
Vacations are important. At the U, we have a very generous vacation policy, and I encourage everyone to use your vacation wisely. Don't try to "save up" your vacation - use it. After all, studies tell us that taking a vacation can not only improve your mental health, but help you live longer as well.
For example, I'm planning some vacation time for myself later this year: in early May, I'm planning a trip to Michigan; in late May, to Madison. In the summer, I'm meeting with friends in Chicago.
At the same time, I ask that you plan ahead for your vacation. Discuss your vacation plans in advance with your teammates and your manager, so everyone knows when you will be gone, and for how long. It's very disruptive to everyone if you don't plan ahead, if you suddenly take a day's vacation because you would "lose" vacation time if you didn't.
Take a moment this week to look at your vacation balance, and plan a well-earned break.
For those of you who missed it in Ann's all-OIT email this week, she mentioned the OIT self study as part of the upcoming External Review. Part of this involves the follow-up we've done on the OIT Climate Survey Action Team. Since I'm part of that team, I wanted to share Ann's comments with you:
As part of preparing the OIT self study for the upcoming External Review of OIT, one section in the report is on Human Resources in OIT. This section of the report includes an overview of the Climate Survey Action Team (survey and associated work). I share this section of the self study document (thanks to Heather Rafshol, Brad Cohen, Jim Hall and the Climate Survey Action team). While we have provided updates on this work throughout the months, this overview serves to provide everyone with a summary of this effort and the importance of following up on these important recommendations.
“In the wake of a 2008 employee survey, CIO Steve Cawley charged the Climate Survey Action Team to develop an action plan to address three common themes exposed in the survey as areas that need attention. The themes (and corresponding survey questions) were recognition (“I am satisfied with the recognition I receive for doing a good job.”), job clarity (“My job responsibilities are clear so that I know what is expected of me.), and coaching (“My supervisor provides feedback and coaching to me on a consistent basis” and “I receive adequate guidance from my supervisor to succeed in my job.”). The charge required implementation of the action plan to show improvement in these areas through future surveys and other tracking measures.
The team is composed largely of volunteers from across OIT with additional support from central OHR. Through the summer and fall 2008, the team worked through an OHR designed process to fully understand the survey results and develop a set of recommendations. In order to better understand the issues generated by the survey, a series of focus groups with OIT employees were conducted, identifying underlying causes that gave rise to the focus group and survey results. A set of prioritized recommendations was then shared with senior management and all staff in OIT in December.
Recommendations aimed to accomplish three goals:
The recommendations have been approved by senior management and accepted by staff. The action team has moved to manage implementation of the recommendations, and currently is focused on creating an evaluation strategy to gauge the impact of the recommendations. The action team will move forward with a rolling membership, and a number of supervisor volunteers are in the queue to keep the momentum going. Specific recommendations include:
Foster Environment of Supervisory Excellence
Bring Value and Consistency to Performance Review Process
Foster Environment for Employee Development
General Recommendations
In October, we formed the Operations & Infrastructure group, part of OIA. While we've had two all-OIA meetings since then, we haven't had an all-team meeting for Operations & Infrastructure.
Please join me on Wednesday, March 25 at 2:00 for our first Operations & Infrastructure team meeting. Topics covered at the meeting will be:
There will be time at the end for some Q&A, but please understand that I will not be able to answer the "OIA" questions. Those should be left for Doug at the next all-OIA meeting.
I hope you will be able to attend. If you are not on vacation or have an appointment, I will see you there.
Thanks!
