Macquarie U management is proposing to update its student admin IT system. It pulls no punches explaining the need

With a 16 year old system, including “processes, positions and responsibilities” that “have remained static” since introduction, IT leaders argue the university lags behind student and academics expectations for “ ‘anytime, anywhere’ access to services and resources.

Management also argues having four “functionally diverse teams, … providing services to different stakeholders” is unsustainable.

And then there are the indispensable IT-ers, “with several key dependencies on individual staff.”

“Significant progress has been made in documenting the operational processes and providing training in documenting the operational processes and in providing training to university staff in specialist areas. However… “ (and it is less a huge than Himalayan however), “the combination of the absence of documentation and key persons dependencies presents an immediate risk to critical high volume functions supporting students.”

So, everybody clear on that – the system is so old it is coded in Aramaic and if a few people get the flu it starts running via abacus.

So, what is to be done? Gosh, who would have thought – the university is proposing a spill and fill, with 14 jobs to go and 13 to be created. But even if everybody on the org chart now makes the cut it will cost some of them money, with five HEW eight staff positions going and only three created.

Macquarie observers say this is all reminiscent of the 2016 central IT restructure when 60 positions were spilled (CMM April 18 2016).