My purpose and passion are driven by people and what makes them successful in accomplishing their goals and dreams. I have lived my life and career in education, supporting the use of technology as a tool to help students and educators succeed.
I like technology, but I like people more, so I am a collaborative and inclusive partner, seeking to learn and understand the needs of those I serve before developing or guiding toward a technology solution. As such, I am focused on building strong partnerships and actively engaging stakeholders at all levels to ensure that my team and I walk in their shoes, develop technology strategies, and provide services that align with their needs.
As a leader in higher education technology, the philosophy that I follow, and employ my team to follow, is that if we prioritize the management of needs with the management of technology, we will be successful technology partners.
I engage with partners at all levels to ensure I am a partner in their success. I talk to students, faculty, staff, parents, executive leadership, and others to understand their needs, problems, and successes, and to discover opportunities for improvement. Those improvements may involve initiating a new project or changing the way we support and deliver IT services. Through project and planning engagements, I ensure that relevant stakeholders are engaged appropriately, with support from project managers, whether in project teamwork or other outreach to provide input. To ensure services are continually operating at the ideal level, I seek opportunities to gather feedback through continual process improvement mechanisms.
As the Director of Strategic Project and Service Management, I provide direct advisory and management support to the CIO for strategic change and organizational development work. This can include work that is outside the norm, sensitive, or strategically critical, requiring a keen sense of political, policy, and personnel acumen to ensure success. These tasks may be new projects, policy work, or operational in nature that require a high-level of trust and a unique leadership approach.
I am highly engaged as a leader within the IT staff community at Western Michigan University. As the lead for enterprise-wide project and service management, I utilize a servant leadership approach, as the systems and processes that my team and I provide are utilized by all IT staff to perform their daily operational ITSM workloads, as well as project-related planning and work management. I lead weekly change management meetings and monthly IT community meetings to maintain high levels of communication and engagement with all IT staff, and schedule ad hoc project and operational meet-ups to provide updates and opportunities for collaboration. I ensure that the Project and Service Management Office is available as a partner and connecting resource for all IT staff and their departmental constituents.
I treat my team as my most trusted advisors, but hold them to high standards in key areas of their work. I require them to maintain a focus and balance on standards in the following areas:
Customer service and support are the top priority. Listen, respond, and support the customer's needs above all else. Actively seek opportunities to improve customer service and IT service management processes, procedures, and communications.
Support your peers across the IT community and the university in accomplishing their professional work. Be a partner in providing positive, productive feedback and collaborative efforts in accomplishing shared goals.
Demonstrate expert-level competency and proficiency in the technology you manage and actively seek professional development to maintain the knowledge and skills as technology changes.
Maintain the knowledge and skills to manage minor projects and change within your immediate area of oversight and to engage in higher-level IT projects as a team member.Â