OVERVIEW

Shared services and common platforms are the foundation for cost optimization, bringing UHS universities, colleges, divisions and central IT departments together to meet IT service expectations while achieving cost savings. The stakeholders collaboratively develop business processes and service level agreements that produce the greatest value to the University and the UH System.

A great accomplishment is the completion of Technology Reviews for almost all UH colleges. We will continue our efforts to assess technology services in new academic units like the College of Medicine and College of Nursing. In a broader context, UH shared best practices in establishing uniform, systemwide IT facilities standards at the international 2023 EDUCAUSE conference.

CURRENT STATE

• Technology Managers (TMs) in each college and division implement IT policies and work with UIT service managers to create the optimal balance between central and specialized services for their units. 
• Technology Reviews seek specific ways to improve the delivery of IT services within a college, division or system university. Since the program began in 2010, UIT has reviewed 10 colleges, five divisions (or sections of them) and all system universities.
• Completed Technology Reviews for the College of Business and the College of Architecture and Design.
• Completed annual IT Service Assurance reports for 13 colleges and divisions.

PATH TO SUCCESS

• Continue to identify and implement common technology platforms both across the campus and systemwide (e.g., PeopleSoft, Canvas LMS, Microsoft Teams telephony, Microsoft 365, website CMS and cloud storage). This will foster adoption of best practices and achieve greatest economies of scale and lowest total cost of ownership. 
• Continue systemwide initiatives to deliver business value through unified processes for additional, key technical activities like IT security, network standards, enterprise infrastructure planning, IT assessments and best practices, change management, continuity of operations and IT management tools.

FY2025 INITIATIVES

• Conduct Technology Reviews for the College of Optometry and Graduate College of Social Work.
• Identify services that benefit most from economies of scale as possible candidates for the shared services model.
• Prepare annual IT Service Assurance reports for UH colleges and divisions.
• Seek opportunities to eliminate redundancy, reduce cost and improve standardization across the UH System through the use of emerging technologies such as Artificial intelligence (AI).