I am asked by a few staff members to explain what is the “vision” I have for my organization so that they can help me achieve it. My answer is “Unfortunately, I don’t have much more than what we have already talked about…” which happens to be an unsatisfactory answer to those who ask this vision question. And what we talk about are broad principles that should govern us as described in our strategic plan. In fact, what many want me to answer are specifics in their area rather than a broad organizational vision.
On the other hand, those staff members who are willing to look at what has made us successful and learn from them and help contribute to our success are doing tremendous things. And one of them is creative uses and reuses of technologies. I want to mention a few here.
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It almost looks like all of the recent advances in technologies were created with good intent as well as to reward the inventors with boat loads of money. I cannot think of any of the major technologies that have been invented by responsible companies to assist the bad guys. However, almost all of these great new technologies have and continue to be used in ways that they were not intended and for the detriment of everyone. Here are a few: world wide web – this has been a game changer and has helped bridge the technology gap around the world in meaningful ways, but has been exploited by the criminals in numerous ways; Mobile technology – again, this has revolutionized communication all around the world while introducing another path for the bad guys; Streaming media – this now helps us listen and watch what we want, when we want and where we want, but this also has resulted in intellectual property violations of all kinds; finally Social Media – well, do I need to say anything about this?
My gripe is with the technology companies, especially the startups, who do not pay enough attention to the implications of what they are putting out. They rush to get their products to go viral and this seems to be the focus rather than use current examples as a guide to structuring the products in a way that they are solid in terms of security and privacy and are sustainable for a reasonable time into the future. Of course, unintended consequences are part of the game because no technologist can ever see before hand how a criminal is likely to think and take advantage of the technology being rushed out. But…
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We hear a lot about mentorship in the context of middle managers who aspire to be leaders. You can read more about Mentoring as an EDUCAUSE Special Topic. I thought this is a great time to talk about someone that I consider as my mentor – John Meerts, who was the Vice President for Finance and Administration at Wesleyan University until he retired on June 30th this year. John was the Vice President for Information Technology Services at Wesleyan from 1996 till 2006, when he became the VP for Finance and Administration. I reported to him from 1996-2009 before moving on.
No matter at what stage of your professional career you are, you always should aspire to be better and an important aspect of that is to have someone that you look up to for advice or from who you learn a few things. To me this loosely defines mentorship.
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