Bencheit - Benchmarking higher education IT Ilkka Siissalo and Yvonne Kivi University of Helsinki

Do you know where you stand ? As an IT leader you should know -are you spending too little or too much ? -do you have the right amount of IT staff ? -how big is your IT investment compared with the best of the breed ? Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki2

What is Bencheit Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki3 A EUNIS task force Benchmarking activity to compare IT metrics within European higher education institutions –Initially started in Finland to collect 2010 data: 33 institutions –This year, international pilot with additional HE institutions from other European countries Current way of working –HEIs provide their key data in an Excel sheet –User support: training sessions, web site and help desk –Summary report & a special workshop for discussing the results –Reporting tools for all participants for further analysis and comparison (Excel with raw data, customizable diagrams etc.)

Key benefits Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki4 Compare, understand and improve your IT –Understand your relative position within your peer group –Learn more about your own IT environment Use IT to execute your institution’s strategy –Given the knowledge on what the others are doing - are you really focusing on the right things ? Why Bencheit and EUNIS ? –Higher Education is a global business – national and peer benchmarks do not provide enough information –EDUCAUSE focuses on US style HE institutions and metrics –Commercial services are expensive and limited in many ways

BM2011: Coverage Participants from Finland, Denmark, Norway, UK –Universities: Finland 12, Denmark 1, Norway 2, UK 1 –Universities of applied science: Finland 22 Total number of student FTEs: Total number of staff FTEs: Total sum of operating costs: 4833M€ Total IT-costs: 250M€ Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki5

Institutes of different sizes Min.Max.Average Student FTE Staff FTE Total IT costs0,7M€41M€6,9M€ Number of workstations Total IT FTE Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki6

Principle of total openness You join in and give your data = You get everybody else´s data Participants have the right to view data of any other participating HEI. Data ownership is not given to a commercial company Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki7

Tools needed Excel 2010 –Both the survey form and the report Google, Windows Live ID or Yahoo account –To sign in to… Eduuni, a collaboration platform based on SharePoint –Access rights can be applied to addresses –Everyone can choose which credentials they want to use Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki8

Questions Background information about your HEI Costs and FTE per account group and organisational level, e.g.: –How much money does the IT-center spend on workstation hardware? –How much does the distributed IT spend on staff costs for audiovisual services? Volumes, e.g.: –Number of data centers –Number of IT classrooms –Number of network printers Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki9

Background info Data dimensions Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki10 CostAndFTE Account groups Hardware Software Staff Facilities Outsourcing Other Infrastructure Workstations - Workstations - Printing IT Service Desk Data networks: LAN & WAN Voice services - Telephony - Phone calls Business applications - Finance - Human resources - Facilities - Communications - Student administration systems - Research administration - Library - Teaching IT management Audio visual services Other Services / Sub Services IT-center Other centralized Distributed Organisational level Volumes

Preliminary results Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki All = DK + FI + NO Institution´s FTE vs IT FTE

Costs by… Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki …account group …organisational level

Results: University of Helsinki Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki13 IT costs by organisational level IT costs by account IT costs by service

What to measure? 2,18Student FTEs / IT classroom m² 347€Voice costs / Staff FTE 524€ IT costs / User account 6,8Student FTEs / student workstations 0,7Staff FTEs / Staff & research workstations 7,6Tickets opened / Staff FTE Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki14

CIO summary Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki15

Feedback and improvements 1.‘Unspecified’ – is it useful? –YES: everybody can participate. –NO: comparison is difficult or impossible. 2.VAT − It is a cost, but is it an IT cost? 3.More advise what to put in which particular service/account category: Help texts in the form of examples. 4.More comments / evaluation about what is beyond the numbers  towards qualitative analysis. Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki

Feedback and improvements 75% said they understood the terms easily and the survey form in Excel was flexible Over 50% feels that it is hard to find the data needed, but almost 90% are confident that the data is accurate Everyone agreed that the CIO summary is useful An average of working days was spent on filling in the survey Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki17

How to participate Meet us at Technische Universität München on Thursday 15th of November us at Visit us on Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki 18

Benchmarking higher education IT / I Siissalo, Y Kivi / University of Helsinki19 Is your IT ”On the sunny side of the street” ?