Leadership and Transformation in an Environment of Unpredictability

Abstract

Successful IT leadership requires a focus on (1) partnering within the organization and between the organization and others and (2) enabling others to develop and implement projects that can achieve strategic goals. At the University of Arizona, we are progressing primarily through strategic partnerships among the IT organization, faculty, and the administration; among faculty, the IT organization, and corporate partners; and between the faculty and the campus organizations that support new learning environments, including IT, the library, the teaching center, video services, and the new media center. As the leadership, our role is to enable the actions that emerge from the partners to be implemented and then maintain the accountability clearly with the partners. Our role is not deciding on the actions. The change process becomes iterative in that each action, once enabled, expands the possibilities and the participants creating a higher level of action. The result is a powerful force which is loaded with creativity and directed at creating a future that leadership, by itself, could never have conceived.Results include a 25 percent participation of faculty in new learning strategies, a new faculty development center, an alliance with Lucent Technologies, a grant for equipment for the center, and a new focus on interdisciplinary collaboration for curriculum development.