E-business Strategy
EDUCAUSE 2001 Pre-Conference
Seminar
Provost and Deans
Questions raised by group discussion:
Do we throw out our traditional semester/contact-hours calendar?
How do we retrofit administrative systems to accommodate a changed calendar?
Under what circumstances do we buy content from the outside?… from companies?… what about consortial (groups of universities) arrangements?
What is needed to provide an adequate e-learning library for students not on campus?
What is needed to insure that all students have adequate computer/network access?
Do we separate the development of the course from the delivery of the course?
What is the difference between e-learning for off-campus students and for on-campus students? What should the difference be?
How do we use technology to build the community of learners and reduce dropouts?
What differentiates our e-learning offerings from those of other institutions?
How do you extend the unique characteristics of your institution to provide a value-added product that someone would want?
Who owns the content?
How do we protect the content for faculty?
How do we protect the content for the institution?
Whose responsibility is it to protect content?
Do we form partnerships with other institutions to enhance student’s distance learning experiences?
Do we require that all faculty provide online content?
What new models of compensation and recognition will be required?
Does the definition of “course” start to change in an e-learning environment (can individuals participate in parts of a course—“returning scholars”)?
How do administrative departments react to and support session-free (non-semester) learning programs?
How does the quality of student experience in e-learning courses compare to that in traditional courses?
How can we combine the best of each approach?
How do we train and support faculty to use e-learning products?
How do you provide an adequate infrastructure to support the faculty one they are “ready to go”?
What kinds of personnel, infrastructure and other resources are needed to build and sustain interest in TLT?
How do you support demand after you’ve built the interest?
What content should be protected vs what should be available to all?
Is the major effort required for e-learning course development harming the research mission?… or student contact?
How do we measure student contact hours for activity/performance reporting?
Mini Case:
“Harvard Law School professor Arthur Miller taped a series of 11 lectures and sold them to the Concord University School of Law, a virtual university founded by Kaplan, Inc.” Joshua Green, “Superstars Online” (http://www.prospect.org/archives/V11-22/green-j-sidebar.html)
Mini-Case Questions:
Do Web courses count as faculty course-load credits?
Do Web courses count toward faculty tenure?
Can faculty sell online course materials to other institutions?
Will the institution continue to use online materials after faculty producers separate from institution?
Would a trend toward online education benefit institution? Faculty? Student?
What are reasons for adopting online education?
Can online instruction replace classroom instruction?
Can online education replace instructors?
Can the student records system support online courses that don’t fall into a traditional semester?
What determines course offerings… student demand or faculty career objectives?
What advantages might online education bring to traditional class lecture environment?
Answer questions, establish policy, procedure and guidelines, state required changes to organization and infrastructure. That is… “What should we do?”
Mini-Case Response:
Web courses count as faculty course-load credits.
Web courses count toward faculty tenure.
Faculty cannot independently sell online course materials. They can, however, partner with the institution to sell course materials within the framework of existing IP ownership policies.
The institution may continue to use online materials after faculty producers separate from institution. Faculty will receive royalty for use of materials.
The trend toward online education benefit will benefit student, faculty and the institution.
Online courses offer increased availability to learning materials. Online courses are not bound by many of the time barriers of classroom instruction. Online courses can extend the availability of materials. Course materials can be tailored to each individual and some learners experience increased interactivity. Online courses can promote collaboration across the boundaries of busy student schedules.
Generally speaking, online instruction is not to replace classroom instruction… it is most valuable as a supplement to classroom instruction.
It is not a goal of our online instruction program to replace instructors.
The student records system requires modification to support online courses that don’t fall into a traditional semester.
Student demand is balanced against faculty career objectives to determine course offerings.
As much as possible, existing policies should be employed to govern and protect the Web course environment.
Institution and faculty jointly own course content.
Additional questions raised:
Should our students be using online resource to take courses from faculty at other institutions? How does that fit in our course offering and degree requirements.
Actions:
Review faculty contract language to determine if existing agreements support joint ownership of course materials and provide for faculty royalties for use of such materials.
Modify the student records system to support courses with no “term” boundaries.
E-business Strategy
EDUCAUSE 2001 Pre-Conference
Seminar
Questions raised by group discussion:
Can we use e-business to expand our influence, market-share, quality, selectivity, build strategic relationships…?
What effect might e-business have on teaching, research and service?
Should we align an e-business strategy with non-e-business
strategy?
Should we allow deviates from e-business practices and policies?
What aspects of e-business enhance the institutional mission?
Do we really need e-business?
What can we do to promote our e-business capability and increase our profile among our peer institutions?
How can we use e-business to leverage partnerships with stake-holders, corporations and government?
How do we measure and assess the success of e-business?
What legal obligations may be created to protect college trademarks and image in the e-business.
How do we align the viewpoints of the academy with the business viewpoints and perspectives of the institution?
How do we provide a structure to guide and ensure uniformity in delivering e-business with a defined institutional image?
How can we consistently project the institutional image?
Mini-Case: “The charge of this working group is to make recommendations that can be used to crate web pages that community the University’s unique brand identity.” Georgetown University Redesign 2001 (http://guide.georgetown.edu/redesign2001/branding/charge.htm)
Mini-Case Questions:
What are the elements of “brand”?
What are examples of successful branding? (in and out of higher education)
How can the elements of brand be represented online?
How can the elements of brand contribute to the institution’s online presence?
Does “departmental brand” compete with “institutional brand”?
Does academic freedom challenge campus-wide branding online?
What central services or infrastructure are needed to support online brand?
What policies, organization or funding changes are needed to improve online brand?
Do we need to be concerned with product branding (software, soda…) competing with our institutional brand?
How do other institutions approach the issue of branding?
Answer questions, establish policy, procedure and guidelines, state required changes to organization and infrastructure. That is… “What should we do?”
Mini-Case Responses:
The elements of institutional “brand” include name, font, symbol, slogans, mottos, logos, reputation.
Examples of successful branding to consider include: Nike swoosh, apple logo, the big yellow “M”, Harvard Business School, “At Ford Quality is Job 1”, MIT, BASF—“we don’t make the things you buy, we make them better”
The elements of brand can be represented online visually using colors, logos and images… also using message and language… sound and music… look and feel… by associating celebrity with alumni (Bill Cosby and Temple).
How can the elements of brand contribute to the institution’s online presence?
“Departmental brand” competes with “institutional brand” causing fragmentation of brand… this require rigorous adherence to college branding standards.
Academic freedom should not challenge campus-wide online branding, but it can result in departmental independence that could cause issues.
Central services or infrastructure are needed to support online brand include publications, printing, IT, purchasing, athletics. A policy group involved in implementation, assessment and monitoring.
Policies, organization or funding changes are needed to improve online brand include further empowerment of public relations to have authority over branding leadership.
The institution must protect its brand from trademark infringement.
E-business Strategy
EDUCAUSE 2001 Pre-Conference
Seminar
CFO and Exec VP
Questions raised by group discussion:
Who will be allowed to make various purchases via e-business?
How will we empower more people (everyone) to make purchases w/appropriate checks and balances?
What addition services and goods can institution sell to faculty, staff, students, alumni and public?
How can e-business improve the image of administrative services?
How can e-business be used to determine which courses/programs the institutions offers (based on cost/subsidies, etc) and determine the students it want’s to attrack?
How will e-business be auditable?
Mini-Case: “We had an interesting proposal from our Career Development department asking about the propriety of charging off-campus employers a fee for us to place on our Career Development web page a “link” or a “company logo” (priced differently) to the company’s own web site employment page” CIO Listserv, October 4, 2001
Mini-Case Questions:
Can off-campus advertisement reside on campus web pages?
Will such advertisement be free, or require payment to the institution?
Who would establish or approve advertising fees?
How would such revenue be allocated?
Are there restrictions to the use of revenue from such advertising (for example: scholarship only).
What about accepting free services in return of ad placement.
Is on-campus advertising hosted on the campus web?
What central service or infrastructure is need to host off-campus or on-campus advertising.
May links to commercial sites be used if they do not imply endorsement?
How can corporate logos or trademarks be used on the campus Web?
Answer questions, establish policy, procedure and guidelines, state required changes to organization and infrastructure. That is… “What should we do?”
Mini-Case Response:
Off-campus advertisement may reside on campus web pages subject to general institutional policies.
Such advertisement requires payment to the institution.
The CFO in consultation with Public Relations and other will establish and approve advertising fees?
Revenue allocation will be situational… rules and cases for how revenue will be split will be determined for each different situation.
There will be no restrictions on the use of ad revenue.
The institution will accept free services in return of ad placement… subject to currently existing institutional policies.
Internet access will be the only central infrastructure offered to support advertising… The institution will not host ad sites, only link to them.
Links to commercial sites are OK following existing institutional policies and providing appropriate disclaimers.
No corporate logos allows on top level institutional pages. May be used elsewhere subject to existing policy.
E-business Strategy
EDUCUASE 2001 Pre-Conference
Seminar
Campus Customers
Questions raised by group discussion:
Will my transactions be secure?
How much control do we demand/take back from the institution?
How will this make anything I do more convenient?
Who bears the increased cost to the institution to allow fee and tuition collection online?
Will institution allow student to be self-paced in the progress to a degree?
As a student, I want to see the costs of services itemized and pick only the ones I want.
How do I get immediate response to admissions approval and other university decisions?
How will the institution provide transaction status reporting?
Consider companies as customers…for example “companies recruiting employees”.
Mini-Case: “Florida Community Can’t Shut Down ‘Voyeur Dorm’” New York Times, 10/5/2001
Mini-Case Questions:
Can students run businesses from their dorm rooms?
If so, are there any restrictions as to they type of business?
Can students run e-businesses from their dorm rooms using campus network or phones?
Can students run servers for non-commercial use in their dorms using institutional network?
Can students participate as two-way peers in peer-to-peer (P2P) network applications?
Is student use of the campus network monitored? Restricted?
How can a student loose network privileges?
Is there a network service level agreement that guarantees students connectivity needed to complete online assignments?
Can students provide their own wireless access points in dorm?
Can student provide their own router in dorm to allow connection of many devices?
Answer questions, establish policy, procedure and guidelines, state required changes to organization and infrastructure. That is… “What should we do?”
Mini-Case Response:
Students should be allowed to run businesses from their dorm rooms.
There should be no restrictions as to they type of business.
Student should be allowed run e-businesses from their dorm rooms using campus network or phones.
Students can run servers for non-commercial use in their dorms using institutional network.
Students can participate as two-way peers in peer-to-peer (P2P) network applications.
Student use of the campus network is monitored and restrictions are to be used only to improve network performance.
A student can loose network privileges by preventing others from accessing network services.
A network service level agreement should guarantees students connectivity needed to complete online assignments.
Students can provide their own wireless access points in dorm.
Students can provide their own router in dorm to allow connection of many devices.
E-business Strategy
EDUCAUSE 2001 Pre-Conference
Seminar
Information Technology
Questions raised by group discussion:
How does the institution benchmark its e-business efforts?
How can we best develop and implement an e-business security policy?
How can IT help deduce underground e-business initiatives?
How can we address IT support and services to ensure consistent and seamless support to student and staff?
How do we align IT strategy with the institutions e-business?
How do we best integrate business processes and owner accountability into the IT e-business implementation?
What is the role of the help desk in cross departmental processing?… “single point of contact”.
What are the key success factors in implementing e-business and in the transition?
How can we align policy change decisions with IT reality so we are not “building yesterday’s systems”?
What and how do we address the authentication issue? What policies should apply?
Where do we get resource to support the transition of e-business while we hardly keep up with the mainstream operational support.
Who is the champion of IT apps needed to support the e-business strategy?
Who has responsibility for implementing and evaluating the institution’s e-business strategy.
How do we make transactions auditable to ensure that departments
can be accountable?
Mini-Case: “My kids have taken my credit card number and started to order things online, and I just want to block those sites so that it will prevent them from doing it again!” Netsitter Download, June 18, 2001
Mini-Case Questions:
Is e-commerce dying on the vine?
Can departments and organizational units sell goods and services online?
Are new policies needed to govern such sales.
Should the institution provide central services to facilitate or coordinate such sales?
May departments collect credit card numbers on departmental servers?
Are departments required to use encryption on departmental commerce servers?
Should the institution provide a central online payment service?
Can departments opt out of such a central service, if they contract with vendor providing similar service?
What kinds of online payments should we be prepared to handle (list them)?
What campus goods and services would make the best use of online payment (list them)?
Answer questions, establish policy, procedure and guidelines, state required changes to organization and infrastructure. That is… “What should we do?”
Mini-Case Response:
E-commerce is not “dying on the vine”, it continues on the increase.
Departments and organizational units can sell goods and services online.
If existing institutional policies are inadequate, new policies will be needed to govern such sales.
The institution will provide central services to facilitate or coordinate such sales, including departmental offerings.
Departments may not collect credit card numbers on departmental servers, but must use central credit card authorization service.
Credit card numbers may not be stored on institutional servers.
Departments are required to use encryption on departmental commerce servers.
The institution will provide a central online payment service.
Departments may not opt out of such a central service by contracting with third-party vendor.
We should be prepared to accept the following types of online payments: credit card, debit, check, foreign payments, small transaction, payroll deduction, pre-paid fees, fines, printer charges.
What campus goods and services would make the best use of online payment (list them)?
E-business Strategy
EDUCAUSE 2001 Pre-Conference
Seminar
Student Services
What are the services?
How do we determine the services?
How do we prioritize the services?
What have other institutions done?
How do we measure the success?
How do we follow up with improvements?
How do we satisfy all the stakeholders?
What is the roll-out schedule?
What is the impact on staff?.. training and support issues, managing change.
Who handles customer service, what are the office hours?
Is there an e-commerce component? Who pays transaction fees?
What are the longer-range plans (so we answer student questions)?
How do we deal with security and authentication?
How do we govern policies?
Is content on site?
It may be important to set process to deal with changes required… quickly!
What are the privacy issues for students?
What are the records, audit transaction requirements?
What are the access issues for students with disabilities?
Mini-Case: “Netscape is unable to locate the server ithaca.mascot.com. Please check the server name and try again”. Mascot Network link, October 15, 2001
Mini-Case Questions:
Can personalized portal deliver improved service to particular audiences?
Where might portal be most effective, prospects, parents, student, faculty, staff?
Will we need to create a business case to justify a portal implementation.
Can advertising revenue offset some or all of the cost of a portal?
Can departments launch their own portals? If so, are there any central guidelines, policies or controls?
Should we outsource, or buy a product, or build our own?
Would a successful portal replace the current Web structure (for a target audience)?
Would a successful student and staff portals change the nature of the institution homepage?
Should our portal support devices other than browsers? If so, what devices should we target?
What do we need to do to bring information from disparate resources into our portal?
Answer questions, establish policy, procedure and guidelines, state required changes to organization and infrastructure. That is… “What should we do?”
Mini-Case Response:
Personalized portals can deliver improved service.
Portals might be most effective for (in priority order): prospects, students, faculty, staff.
A business case should be made to justify a portal.
A portal can be justified as a means to centralize online customer service.
Departments cannot launch their own portal, but should contribute content to campus portal.