Information Technology Leadership Team

Biographic Sketches

August 15, 1995


Introduction


Professor James D. Bruce, vice president for information systems, recently announced appointment of MIT's new leadership team for information technology. These appointments mark the Institute's initial steps towards the new information technology (I/T) framework announced last spring by Mr. William R. Dickson, senior vice president and chair of the Reengineering Steering Committee; Professor J. David Litster, vice president and dean of research, and sponsor of the information technology redesign team; and Professor Bruce.

This framework affects all staff and managers in Information Systems as well as in other central offices who do I/T work. It is aimed at providing the I/T foundation necessary for MIT to succeed in its efforts to reengineer the Institute's administrative processes. Professor Litster has explained that the new I/T framework addresses a major challenge faced by the Institute, that of continuing to operate and support present systems while at the same time implementing and helping people use the major new systems such as the new financial system needed for reengineering. Professor Litster noted that the framework's guiding principle is a partnership - between I/T, the Institute's central offices, and I/T customers - committed to a shared I/T mission of quickly creating systems that deliver significant business value.

In the new I/T framework, teams are the center of the action. They are accountable for results and for delivering business value, and will be provided with the resources and authority to achieve their goals. The framework operates in three dimensions to promote the success of teams: process leaders coordinate the five major aspects of information technology work - discovery, delivery, service, support, and integration; competency group leaders coordinate the development of new skills and the sharing of existing skills throughout the Institute's I/T community; and practice leaders sharpen the focus on customers and ensure that MIT's I/T resources serve the needs of specific constituents, e.g., academic computing, and office computing.

In the new framework, individuals may be on one or several teams, they may be a member of one team and a leader of another, and they may work in more than one process at the same time. "I realize," said Professor Bruce, "that this sounds more complicated than the way we think about work today. However, it is a way of organizing ourselves so we can literally be more effective in delivering value to the community."

Leaders, in the new framework, are responsible for the structure of the processes, for gathering the resources necessary for the operation of the processes, for guiding the performance of the processes, and for achieving process improvement.

Appointed I/T process leaders are:


Greg Anderson, is the Director of I/T Discovery. In this capacity he will lead activities to plan, direct, and manage work to ensure that opportunities to invest in applying information technology are evaluated effectively and appropriate implementation strategies are established.

Mr. Anderson came to MIT in 1989 as Associate Director of the MIT Libraries for Systems and Planning. In that capacity he has been responsible for leading the team that selected the Libraries' new automation system and led its installation. He has also been co-principal investigator, with Professor Jerome H. Saltzer, of a project to place MIT Computer Science Technical Reports on-line. Mr. Anderson has also had a lead role in the University Licensing Program (TULIP) sponsored by Elsevier Science Publishing to place page images of Elsevier materials science journals on-line for the MIT community. Prior to coming to MIT, he was head of the Library Systems Office at the University of Georgia. Earlier, he worked at the Library of Congress for a decade in a number of positions. Mr. Anderson received the AB degree from Davidson College in 1972, the MA from the University of Georgia in 1976, and the MSLS degree from the Catholic University in 1981.

Roger A. Roach, is the Director of I/T Service. In this capacity, he leads the service process which is charged with maximizing the value to MIT from operating and managing the life cycle of the Institute's major I/T assets. As Director of I/T Service he will be responsible for operating the campus' information technology assets including the Institute's central computers, the MIT computer network, the Athena clusters, and the 5ESS telephone system.

Mr. Roach first came to MIT as a student in the fall of 1963. As a student he worked in mechanical engineering on the Textile Information Retrieval Project. In 1967, he joined the Computation Center, which later became an integral part of Information Systems, as a systems programmer. There he worked on a number of systems including CTSS and Multics in support of academic and research computing. In 1984, he became the director of Operations and Systems. In this role, he has been responsible for supporting administrative computing on the IBM mainframe.

Cecilia R. d'Oliveira is the Director of I/T Support and leads the process to help everyone in the Institute community make effective use of information technology in their work.

Ms d'Oliveira joined the MIT staff in 1983, and comes to this position from being director of Distributed Computing and Network Services in Information Systems. Her initial responsibility at MIT was with Project Athena. She also served several years as director of information systems planning. In the coming year, Ms d'Oliveira's highest priority will be the implementation of a reengineered I/T help desk. Ms d'Oliveira received the SB degree in Computer Science in 1977, and the SM degree in Management in 1979, both from MIT.

Susan Minai-Azary is the Director of I/T Integration. The integration process has responsibility to maintain an effective, cohesive I/T infrastructure that will enable timely response to institutional, technological, and business change. By including a separate integration process, the leadership team expects to build a richer and more consistent administrative computing environment at the Institute.

Ms Minai-Azary has worked in a number of positions at MIT for twenty-seven years, first as a scientific programmer at Lincoln Laboratory and more recently as Manager of Database Services in Information Systems' Administrative Systems Development department. In addition to her new responsibilities, she is the Captain of the Reengineering I/T Infrastructure Readiness Team. Working with this team, Minai-Azary has helped to bring new I/T infrastructure components to MIT. Ms Minai-Azary received the BS and MS degrees in Mathematics from Michigan State University in 1965 and 1967 respectively.

Timothy J. McGovern and Shirley M. Picardi have been appointed Directors of I/T Competency Groups. In this capacity, they work with individuals, team leaders, and others to ensure that skilled I/T staff are available when needed to work in MIT I/T processes.

For the past four years, Mr. McGovern, as Manager of Development in Distributed Computing and Network Services, has been responsible for Athena software development projects. He was also involved in the development of network software such as TechInfo and TechMail since he rejoined the MIT staff in 1986. Mr. McGovern received the BA degree in international relations from St. Joseph's College in 1971.

Dr. Picardi, MIT Bursar for the past ten years, has held numerous positions of increasing responsibility at MIT over the past two decades. Prior to being Bursar, she held positions in the Alumni Association, and in Resource Development. In 1989, she received the Gordon Y Billard Award for special service of outstanding merit to the MIT community. She recently was a member of the Reengineering Core Team, and the Mail Committee. Dr. Picardi received the AB degree in chemistry, summa cum laude, from Harvard University in 1970, the SM and Ph.D. degrees in Food Science and Technology from MIT in 1972 and 1976, and in 1981 received the SM degree in Management as a Sloan Fellow.

Dr. Gregory A. Jackson and Ms Diane M Devlin have been appointed I/T practice leaders. Practice leaders advocate on behalf of the effective use of I/T among their constituencies and promote the I/T needs of these constituencies among I/T teams and staff. Their primary responsibility is to strive for excellence in the computing environment and services, ensuring that MIT's information technology resources meet the needs of our faculty, students, and staff.

Dr. Jackson is the Director of Academic Computing. His position on the information technology leadership team is a continuation of the responsibilities he has had since 1992. Since then he has been responsible for the general oversight and coordination of Athena. Before joining Information Systems, he was Director of Educational Studies and Special Projects in the Office of the Provost, and Special Assistant to the Dean for Undergraduate Education. Dr. Jackson has been a freshman advisor, has offered a freshman advising seminar for a number of years, and has also served on numerous Institute faculty committees. Prior to coming to the Institute he was an Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University. He received the SB degree in engineering and history from MIT in 1970 and the EdD from Harvard University in 1977.

Diane Devlin is the Director for Office Computing. Her primary goal is to build strong, collaborative relationships between the MIT administrative and I/T communities to provide the community with the maximum value in information resources. Ms Devlin came to MIT in the fall of 1988 as Assistant Director in the Department of Purchasing and Stores. She worked on the core team that designed and delivered EREQ, an on-line, requisitioning system and business information tool. Ms Devlin also managed the purchasing activities and personnel at the General Purchasing Office. Prior to coming to MIT she held positions of Associate Director of Purchasing at Boston University and earlier, Senior Buyer at W.R. Grace. Over the last year, she has served as captain of the Supplier Consolidation Team. Ms Devlin received the BA in management of community planning from the University of Massachusetts, Boston and the MS in management from Lesley College.

Also on the leadership team, which is led by Professor Bruce, is Marilyn McMillan, Implementation Captain for I/T Transformation. The implementation captain's role is temporary, to focus on accomplishing the I/T transition smoothly and on coordinating it with other reengineering activities.

Ms McMillan has been the director of information systems planning at MIT since 1990, helping managers and staff in IS and other offices mobilize initiatives, prioritize efforts, and allocate resources. Working in the office of the vice president for information systems, she has overseen the Institute's information security program and facilitated the introduction of continuous improvement techniques in IS. Since joining the IS staff in 1977, she has worked as systems analyst, project leader, manager, and director of various IS activities, following experience in private industry and the public sector. Last year Ms McMillan served as a member of the Core Team for Reengineering and subsequently as captain of the I/T Transformation Team which designed the new framework for I/T work and the migration strategy now underway. Among her outside activities, she leads the faculty of the directors program of the CAUSE Management Institute, a professional development program for those who manage information technology resources in higher education. McMillan earned a BA in Political Science from Douglass College of Rutgers University in 1967 and has done graduate study in urban planning and in technology strategy and policy.

Two openings remain on the team - the Director, I/T Delivery and a third Director, I/T Competency. Searches for these positions are now underway.

The I/T leadership team plans to complete the transition of Information Systems to the new information technology framework by December 1995, and the transition of the other central administrative I/T efforts to the new framework by June 1996. The I/T leadership team and the IS staff are committed to learn their way into working in the new framework, and to ensure that the new framework works for I/T, for customers, and for the Institute.