Skills Gap
Accessing the right skills across multiple environments and platforms is a challenge for small and mid-size institutions.
FULLY MANAGED IT
Full IT Outsourcing
Our built-for-higher-education fully managed IT outsourcing (ITO) service delivers a streamlined approach to delivering modern IT services for colleges and universities.
CHALLENGE
Resources, Reliability, and Resilience
The technologies that colleges and universities rely on every day are changing rapidly, and so are the risks associated with managing a reliable and resilient technology infrastructure. Add to that the demands from students, faculty, and staff for a more streamlined and integrated experience. Filling this gap is challenging due to a lack of the right skills, staff turnover, and aging technology stacks. This generally results in a keeping-the-lights-on mentality from IT, rather than a focus on transforming the environment to better serve the campus community's needs.
Common Technology Issues Facing Institutional Leaders
24/7 Availability
Smaller IT teams lack the ability to deliver 24/7 management of infrastructure and users, let alone think about transformation.
Aging Technology
Diverse technology environments, with legacy systems and technology, impact reliability, resiliency, and security.
Cybersecurity
Fixed budgets and resources make it increasingly difficult to manage the rapidly changing cybersecurity threats.
Technology Sprawl
Large campus environments, designed to be open by nature, create management and security challenges for IT.
User Demands
Students, faculty, and staff demand a more seamless, integrated, and reliable Uber-like experience.
SOLUTIONS FEATURES
Fully Managed and Mission Aligned
Our fully managed IT outsourcing approach leverages a globally integrated delivery model that strengthens IT operations by bringing clarity to complex technology decisions and builds more resilient, secure environments that support your academic mission. With a team of more than 300 professionals and more than 20 years of experience in higher education, we help transform and manage the technology that you rely on every day. Our team becomes part of your team, with a shared mission and a focus on delivering superior experiences for students, faculty, and staff.
CXO Leadership
We bring a team of higher education CIOs and CISOs on a full-time or fractional basis to provide team leadership.
Mission-Aligned Strategy
From establishing a new plan to transform the learning environment to updating an existing one, fully aligned with the institutional mission.
24/7 Management
By leveraging our global delivery model, we can support institutions around the clock with skilled team members.
Skilled Resources
With more than 300 global professionals, we can access the right skills at the right time to meet complex delivery requirements.
Operational Resilience
With a team of more than 300 professionals in the US and overseas, we eliminate turnover risk and skills shortages.
Predictable Economics
Establishing a multi-year strategic plan establishes a predictable cost model with transformation built in.
Compliance
Our team is trained to ensure all regulatory frameworks are met, including alignment with GLBA, FERPA, PCI/HIPAA, and other requirements.
Cybersecurity
Our security operations center (SOC) ensures a reliable and safe environment, from endpoints and devices to people and processes.
Frequently asked questions
What happens to our existing IT team if we move to a fully-manage IT outsourcing model?
We evaluate the existing team and strategy, identifying areas for improving support, transforming technologies, and aligning with the institution's mission. We have an established assessment model to ensure fit and have a time-tested transition model to move employees from the institution to OculusIT.
Do we have to outsource our entire IT organization, or can we start with specific functions?
We have a flexible approach to Managed IT, with many institutions starting with OculusIT managing an individual application or a service area, such as their network operations center (NOC) or security operations center (SOC).
How do you ensure the outsourced team understands our institution, culture, and academic mission?
At the start of our engagement, the OculusIT team immerses itself in your institution's culture and what makes it unique. We maintain that alignment by having our leadership be a fully functioning member of your leadership team, understanding where change needs to happen and the organizational and financial objectives.
Who is accountable for IT performance and service levels?
We establish a clear baseline for your institution at the start of the engagement and agree on a set of key service-level agreements (SLAs) to be met. Once established, we hold quarterly reviews with monthly reporting to ensure all SLAs are met or exceeded and to identify performance gaps that need to be closed.
How do you handle staffing gaps, turnover, vacations, and hard-to-fill technical roles?
Our global delivery model, combined with US-based resources enable us to easily cover staffing gaps and fill hard-to-find roles, and we are seen as an employer of choice in many markets.
Will we lose control over our technology strategy or decision-making?
No, just the opposite will happen. We fully embed our team with your leadership team to understand your mission and priorities. We then build a mission-aligned plan to enhance the learning environment in a staged, deliberate manner.
How do you protect institutional data and manage cybersecurity and compliance requirements?
This is one of our core tenets: everything we do is cyber- and compliance-aware, and our team is trained to establish and maintain a secure and compliant higher education environment.
How does the transition work, and how disruptive is it to faculty, staff, and students?
Our primary objective is to maintain technology continuity while assessing the existing environment and team. We then implement a staged plan to migrate people and technologies to the OculusIT platforms and systems and begin establishing the future-state plan.