Thursday, January 31, 2013

Lynda is Here!!!

I would like to introduce you to Lynda....Lynda . Com. 

Lynda is the newest member of our team. Lynda was hired specifically for you. Let me tell you a few things about Lynda:
  • She is smart; she knows a little about every technology topic that you might imagine. 
  • She is a teacher, teaching primarily technology oriented topics. 
  • She is fast; she typically teaches in 1-5 minute bursts. 
  • She is available. We had a little work to get this one through HR, but her shift is 24x7x365.
  • She can help all of us out by answering our questions...pronto. She is one click away.
You can meet Lynda by following the instructions below. Spend some time with Lynda to get to know her. I think you will find her to be one of your new BFFs.


Ray




This is an email that went out from John Hammond on this topic this morning:



Description: cid:image001.png@01CDFF95.5EA53DF0
 
Good Morning,
 
Information Technology Services is very excited to now provide unlimited access to lynda.com for all students, staff and faculty. Lynda.com is an online library of courses covering topics from photography to project management. 
 
Here are just a few of the benefits to using lynda.com:
•           Courses include a wide variety of technology and disciplines
•           Up-to-date content helps to keep your skills current
•           New courses are added every week 
•           Access to instructors’ exercise files let you follow along as you watch tutorials
•           Closed captioning and searchable, time coded transcripts for increased comprehension
•           Beginner to advanced courses to learn at your level
•           Watch complete courses or individual tutorials as you need them
 
To access lynda.com, go to http://iplogin.lynda.com and create your user name and password.  You must use your Grinnell email address.
 
You must be on campus the first time you create your account, but after that you can access Lynda.com from anywhere! If you are an existing lynda.com member, you can use your current user name and password to create your profile. Once your profile is created, you will be able to access lynda.com directly through http://www.lynda.com from anywhere! To learn more, we suggest that you watch the introductory movie about the service, and also access the How to use lynda.com course.
 
Introductory Movie:
 
How to use Lynda.com course
 
Please contact the Grinnell Technology Services Desk if you have any questions or issues signing up for or into lynda.com.
 
Best regards,
 
John Hammond
Technology Services Desk Manager

There is Something Very Phishy Around Here...

Phishing!!!!....Urrrrghh!!!!

We seem to be under siege lately from phishing attacks. These fake, unwanted email solicitations look real and do a good job of luring us in. Then, Bam!...we find that they have stolen our email identity and password and started working on our computer work under our identity. 

What is so bad about this?

Several things:

First, I don't want my identity compromised. Everything...passwords, emails, files... Once the phishing site has it, the phishing site can disburse my personal information wherever it chooses. Kind of like a home invasion. You never feel safe in your home once it is compromised. 

Secondly, our Grinnell email servers get tagged as phishing servers, sending out erroneous information to others. In the internet world this is bad. Our servers carry a "good guy" or "bad guy" score, kind of like your credit score. When your score goes down, other servers around the world will not let you talk with them. They take your emails, etc. and throw them into a trash can. Now...we don't want that, do we??

Enough of all of this explanation, you get the picture. 

Here is something very, very cool you can do. Go to this site (it is a non-phishing site!!!): 

http://www.lynda.com/Networking-Security-tutorials/managingspamessentialtraining/628-2.html

Establish an id and take the course on Defending Against Phishing Attacks (section 4, second class). 

The above site is for Lynda.com. We just purchased a campus-wide license. There are many, many great classes you can take at Lynda.com. Check it out!

The first time you enter Lynda.com you need to be on campus (security!!!). Establish an id. The site will walk you through how to do this. Give me a post back, if you are having trouble...we can post specifics of how to get in.  

Feel free to post back tips that you have experienced that may help others.


Ray

Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Becoming an Analytics Driven Organization


It has been some time since our last post. I've been watching for items that warrant your attention. We have a few!! I will make them the subject of separate posts over the next several days.

I am greatly encouraged with the direction that we are heading as we strive to become an Analytics Driven Organization. We have the strong leadership of President Kington driving this topic, great interdepartmental teamwork, and a spirit on campus of "let's move ahead." Narren Brown (Office of Analytic Support and Institutional Research), Angela Voos (Office of the President), Brent Jaeger (ITS), and Jon Case-Minners (ITS) have been major players. There is some significant work underway in the divisions...thoughtful, insightful work.

We must evolve to become a more fact driven organization. We face increasing accountability regarding the effectiveness of our product (education) and the effectiveness of our expenditures. The world we interact with expects us to understand our business quantitatively and respond to their questions.  We find ourselves increasingly incapable of doing so.

The topic of how you become an Analytics Driven Organization is messy; it is amorphous; it requires teamwork. It is one of those topics that make you scratch your head and ask: "Where do we start?" Many organizations start this process, then stop as they lose focus, purpose, and will. 

The way to accomplish this is not to try to create an environment that can answer every question that anyone has ever thought of. “Build it and they will come” is not an effective approach. It also is not effective to install a data warehouse software package and hope that with the press of a few buttons all of our answers will be magically spit out. 

Rather, there is a cultural change that is needed in the institution, a kind of DNA alteration in how we think of information (data) and its use. We need to become an organization where data is an institutional asset, versus a personal asset or departmental asset. Everyone can view and use "our" data, given the proper security authorization. Our business processes change so that others may access information that we hold or have sourced. Data is named according to institutional standards, so that it can be found and understood by others. And, policies govern the creation and use of data.

We will evolve incrementally, thoughtfully. We will create results as we progress. As we move forward together, we will increase interdepartmental collaboration, sharing of data, and teamwork. 

Yesterday, in the Grinnell Senior Leadership meeting, a plan for accomplishing the above was unveiled. President Kington created a strong vision of where we are headed. Houston Dougharty, Mark Peltz, and Beth Halloran presented excellent, sample scenarios of how the lack of access to data and analytics impairs their operations. Main challenges were presented: naming conventions, data holes, quality/accuracy, completeness and sharing. Lastly, the specifics of our next steps were presented. 

Over the next couple of weeks the Senior Staff will discuss the top analytics oriented questions that will affect the institution. Each Senior Staff member will bring to the table their most pressing questions. They will be discussed and prioritized. We will then take the top 1 or 2 questions and create a project charter to answer each question. The project charter will define our approach to answering the question, deliverable dates, and who will be involved in the project team. Our goal is to achieve results. We will incrementally approach the answer to questions in this fashion. Over time, the repository of information that we build will grow. Our familiarity with the process will grow. Our cultural perspective will evolve. 

We are on an exciting path together. 

You may wish to check out the slides that were presented yesterday at: 
http://www.grinnell.edu/file/69462


Ray