Five Key Themes from UCISA-PCMG23

In a world where the pace of technological progress continues to accelerate, it is unsurprising that established, large, and traditional organisations of the Higher Education sector are having to work very hard just to stand still. These same organisations are currently experiencing a storm of external forces, detailed amongst the following themes, driving the need for immediate and large-scale Digital Transformations.

Universities and similar Higher Education organisations experience common sector-wide challenges in Digital Transformations. Andrew Proctor (Executive Lead, UK Education at Amazon Web Services and former Pro Vice Chancellor of Staffordshire University) spoke about consolidating these universal challenges into the “The Square of Despair” with capability, legacy, procurement, and security at each corner. Specifically, it is the frequently lengthy and inefficient policies and procedures around each of the square’s corners that make it difficult to drive innovative change; the speaker drew a laugh from the audience when he compared some typical university procedures with uncannily similar suggestions from the CIA’s “Simple Sabotage Field Manual (1944)” once used in resistance efforts to sabotage organisations through driving inefficiency. Given the inertia brought about by these embedded structural and cultural factors, it is perhaps unsurprising that innovative change is being primarily driven by external factors.

Andrew Proctor Executive Lead, UK Education at Amazon Web Services (former Pro Vice Chancellor of Staffordshire University) speaking on success in Digital Transformations [Image credit of UCISA]

Theme 1: Accelerated Journey to Cloud

A key external factor initiating many Digital Transformations currently is a recent series of announcements of on-prem systems having their lifetimes ended earlier than expected. This is presenting an urgent requirement to either move to Cloud or an alternative system.

These announcements have rocked the Higher Education sector, with some universities left to make these changes in as little as 12 months for core systems. Speaking to project and programme managers amongst the delegates, many are feeling these timelines are impossible to achieve given the challenges of timing against the academic calendar, budget planning, and their lack of resource.  

For those looking for silver linings, universities who have already gone through accelerated journeys to Cloud detail some key benefits. Firstly, in a sector where change is often slow and can take a long time to be actioned, having these external deadlines has brought needed system changes forward as a priority, similar to how rapid changes were actioned in response to Covid. Cloud systems also offer greater security and require less maintenance. Moreover, these projects represent an opportunity to address inefficiencies or pain-points in existing ways of working. Before moving to the Cloud, existing business processes should be reviewed as migration presents opportunities to optimise procedures and data policies to drive improvements in process and data quality.

Theme 2: The Immediate Headache, and the Future Opportunity of Generative AI

In many sectors the shape of the future impact of generative AI technologies (such as ChatGPT or Bard) is still abstract, however within Higher Education the rapid rise of this technology is bringing existential questions to the sector.

“The genie is out of the bottle” said Paul Bartholomew (Vice-Chancellor at Ulster University) of generative AI within Higher Education. He presented the different areas touched by the rise of AI within universities: student assessment; student competence for employment; academic and staff competence and confidence; staff views on its use; its potential as a tool for business improvement; the risks it poses around cybersecurity and data breaches; and of course, the technology itself as a growing area of research. Of all of these, the questions around the deep implications for student assessment and the urgent need to revise style and policies of assessment in its wake seems to be the area of AI to which universities are currently giving most attention.

Rather than seeing generative AI as something to fight against, some Higher Education institutions are already beginning to harness it as a tool to improve staff and student experience. Scott Hayden (Head of Teaching and Learning at Basingstoke College of Technology) testifies that having trialled generative AI for content generation and lesson planning they have already begun to see tangible benefits. A recent survey at the college revealed staff using the technology are each saving on average 5.1 hours a week as a result. Similarly, by embracing the technology, and giving student and staff access to approved tools under a university licence, Sophie Moyses (Product Manager at the University of Sheffield) explains that the university is hoping to reduce data and cyber risks from the use of AI. She also mentioned how excited she is that the move to embracing AI means that students will have the opportunity to be assessed in ways which are more relevant to the modern workplace.

Whether the Higher Education sector likes it or not, generative AI is not going anywhere and is pitched to only become more powerful. For example, Microsoft’s new AI technology, Copilot, now in its initial stage of rollout with 20 customers, is full of promise to revolutionise how we work: generating content that sounds like the user from their existing files; and rapidly performing manual tasks with a single prompt, to name a couple of its uses. Increasingly universities that choose to operate themselves and assess their students in ways that resist generative AI technology will find it harder to do so and will risk losing out to their more innovative competitors.

Google Education’s talk lead by Kirri Watson around the opportunity of AI within Higher Education [image credit of UCISA]

Theme 3: Honing the Digital Student Experience

Whilst the Higher Education sector has generally struggled to keep up with the pace of technological change, other industries, in particular social media platforms and online retailers, continue to pioneer innovative and captivating digital customer experiences. This means that the new generation of Gen Z students, digital natives who have grown up in this immersive online world, now expect a student experience to match.

The results are staggering. AWS research shows that 91% of students expect their digital student experience to be on-par with face-to-face offerings from the University and 67% expect it to be on-par with their experience on sites such as Amazon or Facebook. These demands are reflected by an increasing focus on hyper-personalisation of student facing systems. Another defining characteristic of this new generation of students is that they are true digital natives with 45% online almost constantly (10+ hours a day). In this context, Educause (a non-profit association with the largest global community of IT leaders in Higher Education) has called for the need for universities to “meet students where they are” by centralising and streamlining the digital experience. These principles apply to all elements of the student-facing value chain, whether within admission systems, online learning environments, or student apps.

Theme 4: It's All About Data, Data, Data 

The CEO of UCISA, Deborah Green, began her opening address to corporate partners at the conference by going through the 2024 Educause Top 10 trends for the year ahead. Of these 10 trends, 4 directly relate to data. Data is increasingly being recognised as a vital component of Higher Education strategy and was referenced a couple of times through the conference as the fourth pillar amongst People, Process, and Technology. As Ben Barry (Director of Digital Services at the University of Wolverhampton) put it in the JISC Digital Strategies in UK Higher Education paper “universities that get to grips with the digital and data-driven future will succeed. Universities that do not will find it harder and harder to operate cost effectively and efficiently”.

Data is the lifeblood of modern organisations, flowing between core systems and fuelling decisions and operations. System changes due to Digital Transformations offer an opportunity to evaluate new ways in which institutions can derive data value. Educause’s Top 10 give good examples of the type of benefits that are available from insights derived from good quality data: leveraging analytics to improve learning and student success; enabling informed decision-making in an impending enrolment crisis; and understanding finances better to make the tough choices.

Whilst data was frequently mentioned at the conference, there appears to be a growing appreciation that new systems alone do not immediately equate to better data. It takes concerted effort to implement new data governance measures during data migration, and even this does not tackle the bigger challenge of understanding the new integrations required for core systems sitting in the middle of complex data landscapes. An interesting response from UCL to managing integration is the development of EASIkit, their Enterprise Application & Service Integration Toolkit, comprising of the documentation, community groups, training programmes, and technical components and templates designed to support service-owning teams across the university.

Theme 5: Putting People Back at the Heart of Digital Transformations

Reading through the previous four themes, it would be easy to fall into thinking that evolution of technology alone pushes the sector to innovative change through Digital Transformation. However, whilst these may be driving forces, the change itself could not happen without people.

IT leaders throughout the Higher Education sector know the importance of getting the people-part of Digital Transformations right. A poll of the UCISA conference by Sean Green (Director of Digital and Data at the University of East Anglia) revealed the biggest challenges to Transformation Programmes revolved around people; 29% of the conference felt the biggest challenge was having the culture and skills to maximise the benefit of the investment, followed by recruiting and retaining skilled resources (22%) and engagement from stakeholders (22%). A common theme from leaders describing how they succeeded in their Digital Transformations was baking in proactive consultation and gathering feedback of stakeholders into the approach, with the message that “this should work for you, and if it doesn’t, let us know”.

It is just as critical that those managing the delivery of innovative change also feel supported to succeed. Agile approaches to change were a common topic throughout the conference, however many speakers described how the challenge with Agile in the Higher Education sector is creating a culture and an environment that is supportive of the experimentation it involves. Professor Paul Bartholomew (Vice-Chancellor at Ulster University) called for universities to be consistent in their communication around innovation; their innovators must be constantly hearing “it’s ok to experiment” and from their senior management that “if it doesn’t work, I’ll take the blame”. In this way, organisations will better retain their skilled staff and allow the right culture and skills to be nurtured for Digital Transformations to succeed.

The delegates at the conference challenged themselves to our cup stacking game to test how Agile they were. Our Agile Champion, pictured here receiving their prize, is Megan Baber (Project Manager at the University of Wolverhampton)