Top 5 IT Strategy Decisions: Wise Moves
[5 minute read]
Delivering IT change in school helped to widen and deepen our use of Office 365 for communication, teaching and learning. Here is how our IT strategy also worked to mitigate for the effects of the Coronavirus pandemic to enable teachers to work effectively from home:
- IT has to fit the organisation, its current and future needs - strategy helps to identify areas upon which to take action; such as procurement of IT, support and training. Much IT spending in schools tends to be uncoordinated which leads to spending that can be wasteful, unevenly deployed and does not take into account the need for training and sharing best practice.
- Senior Leaders are key to both the adoption of an IT strategy and authority delegated to their Director of IT - the key advisory role encapsulated in an individual who understands both education and IT matters. I am eternally grateful for the support of managers who, 'get it' and embrace the tools and technology.
- Training is essential to support users and break down any possible resistance to change. There needs to be a regular and on-going cycle of training to ensure that new appointees and established members of staff are fully trained. The use of the word 'staff' is important here because schools can lose sight of the need for support and office staff to have their own tailored training progress. The business of schools is to educate and when that covers all members of its community training empowers people to become confident users over time. Training takes many forms from informal sessions to the use of staff meetings, in-house training days and on-going continued professional training events offered in school.
- Employ early adopters because these are the colleagues who can lead by example and take technology to their subject areas. Back in the noughties the term 'champion' was coined and champions are those people whose assistance are needed to help to show others how the use of IT solutions works for them within the context of their teaching. When colleagues see the practical time-saving outcomes made possible by the adoption of technology they are also likely to become advocates. Over time the sheer mass of those using IT becomes a critical mass that pulls along those who might otherwise resist change.
- Team building aids communication and feedback helps everybody to know how they are doing. It offers a level of support to solve technical issues; helps to solve problems and to share solutions. I used Microsoft Teams to help subject leaders to build their own sites for departmental business. This has made Teams has become THE place to find all shared documents and is a portal for shared information and communication throughout school (It also helped a move to the 'cloud'). Using Teams with shared documents has made it possible for any staff member to contribute directly to the weekly staff bulletin and know where everything is from policies to plans, tracking to technical help sheets.
The thread that runs through my top five tips is that people matter. The role of an IT Director is to bring people together for the better use of IT solutions throughout an organisation. That takes empathy (aka emotional intelligence) as well as fortitude. It is a journey of often small as well as larger steps. Whilst IT expertise is relevant the fact is that technology without people remains an under-utilised or neglected tool. When the IT strategy fits people within the context and mission of their organisation can it begin to effect necessary change.