November 20, 2024
IT Transformation Initiative update
Dear colleagues,
I write to you today with an update on the university's progress with the IT Transformation Initiative, which focuses on strategically evolving how we manage, support and organize our IT infrastructure and services.
Enhanced and integrated organizational structure
In late August, we announced that the Phase I IT hiring initiative was underway, which is aimed at filling 10 IT director positions across the institution. We have received incredible interest in these positions, and the searches continue to progress with the support of our dedicated search committee and university leaders. Once the positions have been successfully filled, we will introduce this new leadership team to the university community through an additional update communication.
The launch of the hiring initiative marked the completion of Phase I of our work toward an enhanced and integrated organizational structure, which set the stage by establishing distributed IT leadership roles connected through the Division of IT. We immediately launched into our Phase II work — a comprehensive audit of college/major unit IT organizational structures as they exist today — conducting consultations that will help us develop optimal structures and move toward the future optimal organizational structure for each college and major unit. To date, we have initiated 10 college/major unit consultations, and this work will continue to consume much of the remainder of the fall semester. The timeline for this initiative overall can be found under Phase II on the IT Transformation webpage, but please understand that every college will not follow the same timeline exactly, as we are building solutions and structures tailored to each college's unique needs.
Modernizing and enhancing policies
Since we announced the IT Transformation Initiative last June, a great deal of collaborative work has taken place relative to policy review and enhancement. In collaboration with the deans and academic leadership, the university's data governance team, the Faculty Senate Committee on Technology, General Counsel, and major unit IT leads, we have examined policies regarding use of IT resources; access controls; data use, privacy, classification and storage; and overall security management. As we continue to develop modernized procedures and controls that enhance the security of our institutional IT environment and work toward finalizing these policies, we will continue to leverage the expertise of these committees and technology professionals. Further communications and guidance will be provided to the university community as these policies are adopted.
Updating and formalizing our IT governance
Much of the work over the last few months has focused on our organizational structure and policy enhancement, leaving the update and formalization of our future IT governance structure as our next step in this initiative. We recently presented a draft technology governance process to college leadership for review and feedback and will continue to work with functional leaders to prioritize and align projects across the institution.
As we continue to work together to reimagine and strengthen K-State's IT infrastructure, policies and governance, we appreciate your continued partnership and support in this effort. As we adapt and change together to an ever-evolving technology landscape, we must work together to be vigilant and nimble — and the collaborative work taking place on our structures, policies and governance are setting a critical foundation that will allow us to do just that.
Go 'Cats!
Thomas Bunton
Chief information officer and associate vice president for information technology