Thoughts on comments, emails, conversations, and the TCC:

- One 'meta-comment' that has been asked sotto voce a lot and openly some is, "Who the @!%# is Will Lloyd to develop this reorganization plan?"

• My best answer is that I'm the person given the task by Dr. Sethna.

- And a paraphrase of a follow-up: "You keep saying that we need to improve communication, trust, coordination, and cooperation. Why are you exempt from practicing what you preach? The appearance is that the lack of communication is deliberate. Successful projects must have the information available to all who need it. If lack of communication is a big issue (and we agree that it is), then shouldn't you be truly communicating instead of dancing around every question with 'uninformation'? The campus IT 'information' meeting week before last just made a lot of folks feel that you would be great in politics. You talk a lot and say nothing. If you can't communicate, then how are you going to solve our lack of communication problem?"

• I've said what I knew at the time all along the way. I didn't answer what I didn't know.
  
• Releasing version 0.5 is my attempt to be as specific as I can at this time.
  
• Version 0.5 is, though, an outline with lots of detail to fill in. I thought it was better to get it out early rather than wait until we had every detail in place, for three reasons:
• To let others weigh in on what makes sense and what doesn't.
  
• To improve communication.
• To give people something more than the rumor mill to go on.
• Subsequent versions, and the implementation plan, will supply missing details.
  
• Beyond that, let me know how to improve my communication. I'd like to do better.
  

- A very important question: "Will I lose my job or have my pay reduced?"

• I've been told by Dr. Sethna that nobody will lose their job or take a pay cut because of the reorganization.
• When positions become vacant, the IT units can look at what they need and set the pay for those positions appropriately.
  

- A comment: "Directory services and user account administration are often a function of server administration... Directory services and user account administration on our Windows domain controllers are so closely integrated with Windows server administration that separating the two seems quite inefficient. Creating two positions/departments responsible for overlapping tasks, each reporting to a different unit head, is exactly what we're trying to avoid."

• I see that directory services could fit in infrastructure services. A question: shouldn't routine user account management task be delegated to the helpdesk staff, especially if the helpdeskers use scripts and templates? What do think about this?
  

- A summary of another comment: "Active Directory systems in ITS, COE and A&S are duplicated. Merging them may become the most difficult part of your re-org effort. Management of this function cannot be overlooked or under-estimated. It is what end users deal with most directly, it is the first line of security policy implementation, and it controls every aspect of workstation abilities."

• Yep. This is an area where a smart unified approach can offer real benefits. We have lots to gain by managing directory services well, and lots to lose by messing it up.
  

- "I believe that security staff would best fit in under infrastructure services."

• The essential thing to me is that the security staff has a direct line to the President.
  
• Ideally, security should be a separate unit from all those it has to guide and inspect, but I wonder if we're big enough to have a separate security group. What say you?

- "Will the staff members' knowledge, skills, and current responsibilities be fairly assessed to determine which people to shuffle? I'd hate to have a reincarnation of the FLSA proceedings where staff members are judged without their input."

• 'Yes' to the question, and 'me, too' to the comment.
• (On a personal, mostly unrelated note, I've never been sure why some people blame me for the FLSA affair. I served as a consultant to HR, and you could argue that my recommendations for particular positions weren't correct, but I didn't run the process. Maybe some reader of this blog can explain it to me.)
  

- "Oftentimes resolving a helpdesk request/problem requires assistance from systems administrators and networking personnel. There must be established lines of communication for involving infrastructure services in resolving user services helpdesk issues."

• For sure. The helpdesk should be the single point of contact, but it has to farm out the things that come to it according to who can solve them.
  
• On a related note: Service management administration comes under User Services in the plan, but service management itself is the shared responsibility of all techies. Somebody has to administer the software, develop and run reports, etc., but every group and subgroup will participate in the service management function.

- "Unless some provision is made to have people 'on the rim' between the donut hole and the donut ring, we can expect a lot of initial duplication of efforts and loss of efficiency."

• We need to reduce duplication and overlap to the extent possible, but the two units will and should touch. They will have to cooperate to get the job done.
• Any structure requires effective communication to work well. Communication and working together should be easier with 2 units with defined sets of responsibilities than with the system we have now, but they are no less important.
  

OK, it's after 7 and I'm all done in. More tomorrow.