Application Portfolio Management works with stakeholders throughout the University to address the community's needs.
What is Application Portfolio Management?
Within IT Services, we have organized our application portfolio management services according to five (5) primary areas:
- Student research and information systems
- Student life and teaching
- Facilities, campus and IT
- Budget office, Finance and HR
- Faculty & Research Portfolio
By applying best practices, application portfolio management focuses on:
- Ensuring our existing applications are stable and regularly maintained via planned upgrades; and responding to incidents, requests, and problems with the application. These activities are defined and governed by our IT Service Management processes.
- Identifying the business value/impact and the relative importance of each application to our stakeholders. Together with the stakeholders, we conduct and document regular health reviews of our applications. Various criteria are considered, including technical health and whether the application still fulfills the stakeholders’ needs.
- If the needs of the stakeholders change, they can make a request to either change an existing application or to find a new solution to support their requirements. The stakeholders, with support from IT resources, document these new requirements in a Business Needs Statement (BNS). There are 3 categories of BNS depending on the estimated effort required to provide the solution:
- Enhancements for small initiatives
- Evolutions for medium initiatives
- Projects for large initiatives
- Allocating resources according to the application's condition and importance in the context of stakeholders’ priorities.
In addition to using the IT governance processes already in place such as the Cloud Directive and the software delivery lifecycle (SDLC), the application portfolios also leverage monthly Coordination Committees to keep their stakeholders informed and involved.
Coordination committees
Coordination committee meetings are held on a monthly basis with our key stakeholders to discuss their IT needs and priorities; in the spirit of promoting partnership, communication, transparency, and collaboration. The purpose is to:
- Review priorities of upcoming demands: Business Needs Statement (BNS), requests and others.
- Help steer decision-making regarding prioritizing requests and upcoming projects/initiatives
- Present the status of ongoing projects, audit items, changes and activities that may affect IT services.
- Highlight completed initiatives
- Discuss any other IT related issues or questions
There are currently four (4) ongoing Coordination committees for which the CIO, IT Application Services Director, and Managers of the concerning Portfolios meet with key stakeholders:
- Student (SIS) Coordination: The key stakeholders include different administrative units supporting students. Representatives are from Enrolment Services (ES), Student Services, Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies (GPS), Teaching and Learning Services (TLS), School of Continuing Studies (SCS), Student Housing and Hospitality, and Athletics and Recreation.
- Research (RIS) Coordination: The key stakeholders include the VP (Research and Innovation) and their team. We also have representatives from Strategic Initiatives Unit, Office of Sponsored Research, Office of Innovation and Partnerships, and Research Ethics (Research Office)
- Finance and Budget Coordination: The key stakeholders include the Analysis, Planning and Budget, and Financial Services units. Representatives are the AVP Finance, the Executive Director of Analysis, Planning and Budget Executive Director and directors from the following teams: Systems and Transaction Services, Procurement Services, Student Accounts and Budget.
- Facilities Management and Ancillary Services Coordination (FMAS): The key stakeholders include the AVP FMAS, the Senior Director of FMAS Administration, the Director of FMAS Administration, and the Senior Director of Campus Public Safety. Representatives from other FMAS units are invited when required.
The HR coordination committee governance structure is currently under construction. In the interim, should you have any IT related HR needs, contact IT Services.
