Effective Planning and Management: Methods and Tools for Times of Declining Resources (166182692)

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Effective Planning and Management: Methods and Tools for Times of Declining Resources

|-------------------------------------|| Paper presented at CAUSE92 || December 1-4, 1992, Dallas, Texas ||-------------------------------------|

EFFECTIVE PLANNING AND MANAGEMENT:METHODS AND TOOLS FOR TIMES OF DECLINING RESOURCES

Joanne WilhelmKaren AdamsIndiana University Computing ServicesBloomington, Indiana

ABSTRACT

The common trends of declining funding and increased demand for servicesand accountability experienced by institutions of higher education overthe last few years are predicted to continue throughout the 90's. The

resulting need to do more with less and do it better than ever beforedemands management and planning tools which are both effective and low-cost. Without the use of daily management tools that translateorganizational objectives to the work group and staff level, planningefforts are doomed to failure. This paper presents a set of tools andmethods which, taken together, can and have proven useful in achievingthese ends. The primary focus of the paper is a case study of a suite ofprocesses and tools that Indiana University's computing servicesorganization uses to cost-effectively implement its strategic vision ona day-to-day basis. Each tool is described from a "how to" perspective.

MANAGEMENT REQUIREMENTS IN TIMES OF DECLINING RESOURCES

After decades of incremental increases, higher education administratorshave suddenly been forced to grapple with reduction, reallocation, andretrenchment. They now must pay closer attention to cost effectiveness,careful use of resources, and accountability. Departments, divisions,and work groups must do more with less, and do it better than everbefore. Managers at all levels, especially in information technology,need more effective planning processes and management tools to help theorganization channel scarce resources toward high-priority objectiveswhile maintaining high-quality service. These processes and tools mustenhance productivity while remaining cost-effective. Effective planningprocesses and management tools can change organizations for the better.They provide heightened accountability, improved organizational

responsiveness, and better quality services and support. Butimplementing these processes and tools is both a science and an art,requiring careful timing and attention to detail, such as developingeffective work plans and allocating limited resources. Implementationrequires adeptness in human resource issues, employee participation,communication, and commitment. And it requires that managers beproficient in weaving these processes and tools into their dailyresponsibilities, skillfully guiding staff toward the organization'sshared vision.



This paper presents a set of tools and methods which, taken together,can and have proven useful in achieving organizational efficiency andeffectiveness. It provides a case study of a set of processes and toolsthat Indiana University Computing Services uses to cost-effectivelyimplement its strategic vision on a day-to-day basis.

UNIVERSITY COMPUTING SERVICES

Indiana University (IU), founded in 1820, is one of the oldest stateuniversities in the Midwest. With an enrollment of over 96,000 studentson its eight campuses, IU ranks as one of the largest institutions ofhigher education in the United States.

Indiana University's computing services were traditionally handled bytwo distinct and separate organizations: Bloomington Academic ComputingServices on the academic side, and Information Services on theadministrative side. In 1989 a single computing organization, UniversityComputing Services (UCS), was created by merging the two organizationsand their different management philosophies, technology bases, andcultures. UCS was designed to more cost-effectively provide computingservices to academic and administrative users. It took on campus andsystem-wide responsibilities; its Director reported to the UniversityVice President of Finance and Administration and the Chancellor of the

Bloomington campus. When this Vice President resigned in 1991, theUniversity President created the Office of Information Resources (OIR)and the UCS Director became the University's chief information officerwith the title of Associate Vice President for Information Resources.

The OIR recommends policies and standards, and coordinates computing,video, and voice technologies, networks, learning technologies, andother information technology functions across the University. It hasoperational responsibility for telecommunications, printing, andUniversity Computing Services. The Associate Vice President forInformation Resources reports to the University VicePresident/Chancellor of the Bloomington campus and of the Indianapoliscampus.

UCS today faces another organizational transition. The Associate VicePresident for Information Resources recently assumed a similar positionat another institution. With an acting Associate Vice President forInformation Resources and an acting Director in place, a search bycommittee is under way.

Mission and Organizational Structure

UCS' mission is to create an excellent computing and electronicinformation support environment for scholarship and the servicefunctions that support it. UCS seeks to facilitate the highest quality

research, teaching, and learning; to provide access to higher educationfor Indiana residents; and to enhance the state's economic development.

UCS is organized around the specific technology dimensions of itsresponsibilities and the support services that users require. Theorganization's structure is matrix-like and includes four verticaldivisions that reflect the technology dimensions: Computing Systems,Information Systems, Network Systems, and Workstation Systems. Eachvertical division directs its efforts toward the horizontal dimensionsof the matrix. These include the respective technologies, technology



standards, and planning; user applications; and service delivery. UCS'commitment to delivering effective user support calls for specialemphasis; thus, the fifth vertical division is Computing SupportSystems. It delivers services across all the primary technology areasand supports organizational administration and management.

Management Philosophy

Decision making at UCS is characterized by a participatory philosophyand consensus building at the senior management level. Before makingdecisions that have cross-divisional implications, senior managementconducts discussion and invites input from mid-level and line managers.While this philosophy means more time is spent reaching decisions thanin more centralized decision structures, these decisions receive greatersupport and are easier to implement. In addition, major projectproposals follow a specified senior management review procedure, and arepresented in a standardized format. This format includes the backgroundof the problem, the recommended solution with rationale, alternatives tothe solution, personnel and non-personnel resources, the impact on otherdivisions of the organization, how the project will be managed, and theimplementation schedule. This format and process together ensure thatthe information needed for consensus-based decisions is available, andthat all relevant individuals are included in the process.

Each senior manager is a UCS associate director (AD), responsible forone of the five divisions. Decisions that affect staff or projects ineach division are decentralized to the respective AD who has fullbudgetary and hiring authority in the division.

Strategic Planning and Management Processes Overview

When UCS was formed, senior managers were faced with a largeorganization (250 FTE, 150 FTE) whose collective management processeswere disjoint and disorganized. The organization needed a rational,coherent process to track resources from allocation to implementation.

To help implement integrated management processes, the UCS Managementand Planning Systems group developed a handbook called UCS ManagementProcesses Guidelines and Calendars . This is updated and distributed toall senior and line managers at the beginning of each fiscal year. Thehandbook includes:

** A fiscal year calendar of the annual management cycle (Figure 1).This provides a snapshot of the timelines for planning, budgetpreparation, personnel management, and advisory functions, and shows thelinks between the management processes.

** A detailed schedule of the management process timelines, advisorycommittee meetings, and the academic calendar.

** Detailed management process guidelines for updating the strategic

plan, developing division implementation plans, reporting progress onobjectives, constructing the base budget, producing the annual report,and completing performance reviews and development plans.

UCS Organizational Management Cycle (FY92-93)

[CHART MISSING]

Figure 1



THE STRATEGIC PLAN

In a climate of environmental change, organizations must be especiallyproactive in determining their goals and objectives, and discovering thebest means of allocating resources to achieve them (Keller, 1983). Aprimary tool for addressing these issues and improving an organization'sability to perform its mission is strategic planning.

The importance of strategic planning for information technology has beenestablished and extensively explored over the past decade. Informationtechnology organizations exist in a constant state of change caused byrapid and continuous technological advances and the ever-growingsophistication and demands of their user groups (Penrod and West, 1989).Strategic planning can boost their chances of surviving in thatenvironment.

UCS Strategic Planning Processes

In 1989 over 30 senior administrators and managers, with considerablestaff and user input, prepared the first UCS strategic plan. Theplanning process and resulting document set out the organization'svision, goals, and objectives.

In the two years that followed, UCS used two different processes towrite annual updates to the plan. In 1990, a staff member working withsenior management composed the first draft. The draft was thendistributed to the managers for review, discussion, and refinement. Amore participative and collaborative process was used for the 1991update. Senior administrators attended a strategic planning retreatwhere they drafted a revised set of strategic goals, objectives, andpriorities. This draft was forwarded to a

planning team of representatives from each division who wrote aStrategic Plan Update reflecting UCS strategic goals and objectives inlanguage and format that was accessible to both staff and users.

UCS has not yet determined the specifics of the 1992 strategic planningprocess, in part because the organization is in a transition between apermanent Associate Vice President and a permanent UCS Director. Whenpermanent leadership is appointed, we will most likely develop a newstrategic plan rather than update the original one.

Advisory committees--Their Structure and Input

Key in any strategic planning model is identifying the needs and valuesof the organizational stakeholders and constituencies and building theminto the planning process (Bryson, 1988). UCS seeks guidance from users

and clients on priorities and policies through two advisory committees.The university-wide Administrative Computing Advisory Committee (ACAC)is a body of administrators, professional staff, faculty, and studentswho focus on IU's administrative functions. The Bloomington-campusAcademic Computing Policy Committee (ACPC) focuses on that campus'sacademic functions. This committee includes faculty members, UCS staff,and student representatives.

Both committees take part in IU's technology planning by establishinglong-range (five-year) plans in several major areas of academic and



administrative computing. The ACPC also develops short-range (one year)plans in several specific application areas. These groups play animportant role in UCS strategic planning and budget prioritization;their plans help UCS refine its strategic goals and objectives.

IMPLEMENTING THE STRATEGIC PLAN: TRANSLATING STRATEGY INTO ACTION

UCS translates its strategic objectives and the organization'soperational objectives into annual implementation plans for each UCSdivision. These plans guide each division's actions toward accomplishingUCS operational and strategic objectives for the next fiscal year.

Senior management collaborates on developing the plans and collectivelyreviews them at the end of the process. This level of attention helpsmanagement identify and assign the division and cross-divisionobjectives that feed into UCS strategic and operational objectives. Italso helps them identify and coordinate crucial timelines and staffingrequirements for division and cross-division projects. Most strategicand operational objectives are cross-divisional; making the appropriatelinkages among divisions ensures that the organization's collectiveefforts will work in harmony.

Senior management identifies the divisions responsible for each of the

strategic objectives. Each division then outlines its implementationplan. These plans include the division's operational activities andresource estimates; strategic objectives and projects, with resourceestimates for accomplishing them; activities and timelines that couldaffect the division's ability to complete the projects; and an outlineof project items that involve personnel or non-personnel resources fromother divisions.

With the division implementation plan mapped out, work groups in thedivision develop their plans. These plans describe projects andactivities in more detail and provide the linkage between division plansand staff objectives.

LINKING STRATEGIC PLANNING TO THE BUDGETING PROCESS

Once the organization's strategic vision is expressed as a set ofstrategic objectives, and these objectives are expressed as division-level objectives, an organizational budget is derived. This is acritical part of strategic planning, for nowhere are an organization'spriorities more clearly set out than in its budget. The budget is themechanism most amenable to serving as an implementation tool for thestrategic plan.

The strategic planning literature pays little attention to this stage,perhaps because of the difficulty of aligning the strategic planning and

budgeting processes. Yet neglecting this stage will diminish anorganization's effectiveness, especially when funds are tight andorganizations must be sure their support goes to the highest priorityobjectives.

Difficulty of Aligning the Budget Process with Strategic Objectives

Three factors contribute to this difficulty.



** Most organizational budgets are compiled by division. Butstrategic objectives tend to cross-cut divisional boundaries. Cross-division complexities make it difficult to maintain a one-to-onecorrespondence between budget lines and strategic objectives.

** Organizational budgets tend to be constructed as line-item budgetsrather than program budgets. Since planning strategies are generallydirected at policies or programs, the line-item budget is at odds withthe products of the planning process. Strategic planning strategies dohave line-item implications, but these should be derived by carefulanalysis of the programs and projects that are part of the strategies.

** The inertia of the budgeting process itself should not be takenlightly. Most processes have been in place for some time, often withstakeholders who resist changes that could affect their position in thecompetition for scarce resources. This aspect of strategic planning isrightfully seen as a threat to any part of the organization that is notfurthering strategic objectives.

The UCS Budget Process

UCS' mechanism for integrating the planning and budgeting processes iscentral to the success of our implementation process. Following are some

keys to this success:

** Many objectives require us to coordinate resources across two ormore divisions. Associate Directors handle this coordination before thebudget is constructed, during the division implementation planningprocess. The coordination continues throughout the project, with oneAssociate Director designated as coordinator for each strategicobjective.

** The UCS budget is a program budget. Each organizational objectiveor ongoing activity is designated as a project (or program), enabling usto manage the resources for accomplishing each one. Many projects aredefined directly from an objective in a division implementation plan.

** The project budget is constructed bottom-up. Each division firstcompiles its budget with significant interaction between managers, staffand Associate Directors. These division budgets are merged into anorganizational budget and submitted to the administration of the campusand the University. Working bottom-up, UCS can manage and track projectsthat cross divisions and rapidly reallocate resources to new projectseach year as the environment and our clients' needs change. An automatedinformation system manages the budget. It's built to take advantage ofthe benefits of the program budget, while being flexible enough tomanage costs by line item within and between programs.

GUIDING DAILY STAFF ACTIVITY TO STRATEGIC ENDS

The Importance of Staff Participation

It is not enough to link a strategic plan to the budget process. It isonly when each staff member tailors everyday decisions and actions tosupporting the organization's strategic goals that these goals andobjectives can be achieved. Successful strategic planning processesinvolve staff participation. As service deliverers, staff are the true"front end" of an organization, so must share ownership of and



commitment to strategic objectives. Many otherwise well developedstrategic plans have foundered from failing to carry the elements of theplan into the day-to-day activities of the organization's staff.

Deriving staff performance objectives is a key pan of putting astrategic plan in place. One good way to involve staff is to have themparticipate in developing their performance objectives. At UCS workgroup managers and staff share in this process. Some managers even asktheir staff to provide the first iteration of their performanceobjectives, based on the work group plan.

UCS Staff Performance Review and Development Plan

The performance review document is a written guide to the activitiesstaff should undertake to implement the organization's strategicobjectives. It also shows the relative priority of the employees'various responsibilities in enabling these objectives. When staff helpidentify and refine their objectives, they have a chance to interactwith managers and directors to clarify their role. The performancereview is a vehicle for a "management by objectives" approach toimplementing the plan. The UCS approach most closely resembles themanagement by objectives philosophy (Rodgers & Hunter, 1992).

The two-part UCS performance review process is called a "PerformanceReview and Development Plan Process." Both parts are conducted inwriting at least twice a year; with frequent manager and employeediscussions on objectives occurring during the year.

The first pan of the performance review, completed by staff and manager,evaluates staff performance on strategic and operational objectives forthe preceding year. It helps guarantee follow-through and accountabilityon the organization's goals and objectives. The second part of thereview is the written development plan in which employee and supervisorset next year's objectives, again based on the division and work groupimplementation plans. Objectives in the strategic plan are decomposed tothe division level, then the work group level, and finally to staff

objectives (See Figure 2).

ENSURING ACCOUNTABILITY THROUGH REPORTING ON OBJECTIVES

Once an organization identifies its objectives in strategic and divisionimplementation plans and in individual staff performance objectives, itneeds an accountability mechanism to track progress on those objectivesfor the year. UCS uses a bimonthly reporting process. The reports arekept brief--three pages for each division to reduce administrativeburden on managers. Included are sections on progress (and exceptions)toward key strategic and operational objectives and performance measureson key indicators of service quality.

The reports are constructed through a bottom-up process. Each staffmember reports on individual objectives to his or her supervisor, who,in turn, reports to the managerial level above, and so on, through tothe top of the organization. The bimonthly reports are placed on anorganization-wide file server where all staff can read them. At year'send, the information is consolidated into an annual report on progresstoward goals and objectives and is distributed to our clients.

The combined bimonthly and annual reporting process:



** Provides accountability and tracks progress on objectives for allstaff and the organization.

** Communicates progress on objectives, alerting management toobjectives that need attention, such as deploying different levels ofresources than were originally planned.

** Communicates information among managerial levels, across divisionboundaries, and to our clients.

As an example of the outputs from the UCS Management Processes for FY92-93, Figure 2 displays a decomposition of strategic objectives throughthe staff member objectives and the reporting process.

________________________________________________________________________

INTEGRATING STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES: A UCS EXAMPLE

University Computing ServicesStrategic Plan Update(1992-93)

| Goal 1: Develop and provide distributed computing services and| applications for Indiana University. Develop a networked workstation-| based computing environment.|| Objective 2: Implement distributed services, including the migration| of faculty, students, and staff to workstation-based mail and| conferencing.

Computing Support Services DivisionImplementation Plan(1992-93)

| a) In conjunction with the Program for Distributed Computing,| Computing Support Services will develop and provide the support| services required for the delivery of distributed services and the| migration to workstation based mail and conferencing.||| 1 ) The Education Program will develop and provide computing| classes on the new distributed computing environment| applications.

Education Program Staff Member

Staff Performance Objectives(1992-93)

| a) Develop 2 new JumpStart classes to support the| introduction of the distributed computing environment.| Offer these classes 8 times each during the fall| semester.

Education ProgramSeptember October/1992



BimonthlyReport

| Win the assistance of the Program for Distributed Computing| staff, completed the development of 2 new JumpStart classes,| one on the PC platform and one on the Macintosh platform. || Eight PC classes and eight Macintosh classes are currently| scheduled to be offered during the fall semester.

________________________________________________________________________ Figure 2: How a UCS strategic objective is translated through eachof the management processes.

MANAGEMENT PROCESS ISSUES

While this planning and management process has helped UCS cost-effectively deliver and improve services in a time of budget cuts, fourmajor issues remain.

Staff resistance can be a problem in introducing new planning andmanagement tasks. In technology organizations where there's more to dothan is manageable in a 40-hour week, staff can view these processes as

too time and labor intensive. The utility of each management tool maynot be apparent to those used to spending time on technical issues. TheUCS executive director and senior management devoted a great deal oftime and energy to getting UCS to adopt the new process. During thefirst year, particularly while the new procedures and tools were beingdeveloped, the executive director had to enforce deadlines, even forsenior management. But the consensus building aspects of the strategicplanning process and management and staff commitment to the strategicobjectives helped put the integrated planning and management process inplace. Without such a commitment, this would have been much moredifficult. We continue to struggle to find the right balance betweenspending time on planning and spending time on actually delivering ourservices.

Managing large complex projects that require coordinated efforts by twoor more divisions is another problem. Our organizational structure isdesigned to help us easily realign resources to address crossdivisionalprojects. But a formal matrix management approach, which empowersproject managers with responsibilities that run horizontal to the normalvertical hierarchy of divisional authority, has not been adopted. Giventhe stressful environment during the merger, UCS decided not to empowerpeople as horizontal project managers. Instead, staff committees fromall affected divisions handled coordination. Unfortunately, when thedivision objectives are not fully compatible, this coordination effortoften fails.

As we integrated these processes into our organizational structure, weoften considered the benefits of some aspects of total qualitymanagement (TQM). These processes and tools are consistent with weavingTQM into the fabric of our organization, and we continue to evaluate theusefulness of TQM for our organization.

For many years the only mode of operation higher education organizationsknew was growth and expansion. By contrast, one of our biggestchallenges today is prioritizing what we ought to Stop doing. Thisremains a problem for UCS because there are few clear-cut mechanisms for



prioritizing what we should drop. We are more comfortable dealing withfiscal and personnel constraints by making minor refinements to oursuite of services. But some progress has been made this year byincluding our advisory groups directly in the decision-making process.

BENEFITS OF INTEGRATED PLANNING: CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

In our three to four years' experience using and refining these planningand management tools, we've reached several conclusions that haveimplications for computing technology organizations. These implicationsare general enough to apply to most public sector organizations.

Increases Organizational Efficiency, Effectiveness, and Accountability

Integrating an organization's planning, budgeting, performance review,and reporting processes increases effectiveness, efficiency, andaccountability. At UCS improved efficiency is one of the major benefits.By ensuring that a higher percentage of organizational decisions andstaff activities align with strategic objectives, we pare wasted effortand inappropriate managerial decisions.

Beyond this, the organization's effectiveness is enhanced. This comes inpart from freeing staff time from tasks that are neither strategic nor

required for day-to-day operations and gearing staff activities to"doing the right things" instead of "doing things right." The integratedapproach makes H easier to trace the relationship of individualdecisions and actions to strategic objectives and the organization'smission, and improves accountability to client groups and the Universityadministration. These benefits are especially important in an era ofreduced funding.

Ensures Operationalizing the Strategic Plan

Integrated planning and management enhance an organization's ability tooperationalize the strategic plan and safeguard the quality of itsservices. They help translate strategic objectives from the highest

levels of management to the levels of day-to-day staff implementation.When staff are explicitly included in developing the strategic plan andperformance objectives, they become part owners of the strategicobjectives. This ownership builds commitment to these objectives, andhelps staff deliver services consistent with the plan. Ownership carriesover, too, to the organization's clients. UCS clients are involved inthe strategic planning process, and, through a number of advisorycommittees, in many UCS operational decisions. This represents the UCSeffort, in terms of Peters and Waterman's book In Search of Excellence,to "stay close to the customer."

Provides Cost-Effective Management Processes

Cost-effective integration of these strategic planning processes andmanagement tools can be achieved with a surprisingly low overhead. Theinitial development required UCS to commit between 1.0-1.5 professionalstaff lines for about one year. Even this commitment is a minimalinvestment for the potential return. We hope these tools can provide atemplate other computing organizations can tailor for their own use.Once these processes and tools are developed, the most difficult task isconvincing senior and line management to follow the process timetablesand use each management tool appropriately. This is no trivial task, buteffective leadership and a participatory strategic planning effort can



produce the required commitment.

The first year an organization applies this planning and managementprocess will demand more effort from managers and staff than traditionalmanagement. But once the integrated process is in place and managers andstaff know what to expect, the overhead for maintaining the process isconsiderably less than the effort of budgeting or doing performancereviews without such a framework.

Accommodates Different Management Styles

These management processes are flexible enough to be used by a diversegroup of managers with different styles and management needs. UCSmanagement groups vary greatly. Some managers use a large number ofcontrol or intervention devices with their staff, while others prefermore laissez-faire approaches. These tools can accommodate this range ofstyle.

Responds to Changing Needs

One of the main purposes of strategic planning and management is to helpan organization respond to changing environmental conditions and clientneeds. We saw this proven at UCS when our executive director resignedand the organization was able to continue addressing its strategic

goals. Such a loss of leadership could have caused severe problems hadnot clear organizational directions been in place. The particularstrength of these directions was their tie-in with strategic objectives,division implementation plans, workgroup implementation plans, budgets,staff objectives, and performance review processes.

GENERALIZING THE PLANNING PROCESS

It is our experience that these integrated strategic planning andmanagement processes and tools can be shared and generalized to otherinstitutions. They can help institutions of higher education address thetransition to reduced budgets, increased service demands, greatercompetition, and increased accountability. And they can help

organizations turn these times into opportunities for improvement,rather than a series of intractable problems.

REFERENCES

Birnbaum, William S. If Your Strategy is So Terrific. How Come ItDoesn't Work? New York: American Management Association, 1990.

Bryson, John. Strategic Planning for Public and Nonprofit Organizations:A Guide to Strengthening and Sustaining Organizational Achievement. SanFrancisco: Jossey-Bass, 1988.

Keller, George. Academic Strategy Baltimore: The Johns HopkinsUniversity Press, 1983.

Penrod, James & West, Thomas W. "Strategic Planning for Computing andCommunications" In Brian L. Hawkins (Ed.) Organizing and ManagingInformation Resources on Campus McKinney: Academic ComputingPublications, Inc., 1989.

Rodgers, Robert & Hunter, John. "A Foundation of Good ManagementPractice in Government: Management by Objectives." Public Administration



Review. January/February 1992, pp. 27-39.

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Effective Planning and Management: Methods and Tools for Times of Declining Resources (166182692)