The newly formed IT Connects steering committee and co-chairs held a kickoff with sponsor Bruce Maas on December 7, 2015. There were 6 original groups in IT Connects: I & T Leadership Conference IT Leadership Program Forward IT Mentoring Program Leadership Improv Second Tuesday Leadership Breakfasts UW- Women in IT
Brandon, Deb, and Brenda looked for other Universities that had models for organizing IT community engagement and partnership. Penn State and NYU had umbrella structures for organizing IT professional development that inspired Brandon, Brenda, and Don Nelson (Bruce Maas’s chief of staff) to write a proposal to create a similar organization at UW–Madison. They proposed …
They decided to pilot a topic series for ITLP alumni to research and deliver recommendations addressing critical information and technology issues on campus. The goals of the pilot were to: Leverage the IT Leadership Program- provide a way for them to give back Build the ITLP community around issues of high interest and value Deliver …
The IT Leadership Program Forward was created to make the MOR IT Leadership Program’s process clear, supplement program discussions, and set the expectation that graduates would give back to the IT community. Dan, Brenda, Brandon, and Deborah created the first Information and Technology Leadership Conference in December 2013. It was named “Information & Technology” instead …
To start on their initiative they sought experience and support. They reached out to Dan Jacobsohn, School of Education CIO, who was a former MOR program graduate and had experience spearheading two leadership initiatives at UW–Madison: Leadership Improv and Second Tuesday Leadership Breakfasts. They sought financial and administrative support from Bruce Maas to start two …
When Bruce Maas became DoIT CIO in 2011, he provided funding for anyone in the IT community to participate in MOR IT leadership professional development programs. After the 2012-2013 MOR program Brenda Spychalla, Assistant Director for IT, MERIT, Brandon Bernier, Director of User Services, DoIT, and Deborah Helman, Director of Wendt Commons especially bonded and …