First meeting: November 29th, 2006: Convened at 2:30pm
Present: Bill Dooley, Marshall Fisher, Rob Sprague, Debbie Fulton, Mary Dunker, Morgan Allen, Ron Keller, Anthony Atkins.
Absent: Lylah Shelor
-Handed out notes from earlier meeting regarding charge and scope.
-Mary Dunker would like to see some objective procedural recommendations, such as a set calendar, which can be used generally by all. We need a calendar (or database showing proposed dates) that everyone will consistently use. May need different calendars; one for IT use, one for public use. (For example, beginning of semester, legislative sessions, etc.). DBMS group's calendar does auto reminders for example. Bill will demo at the next meeting.
-Risk Level discussion; can we develop a matrix (Ron Keller has one) to ascertain and establish risk level? Don't want to report every little thing/gray area, some low risk activities *might* affect more broadly than anticpated. Can help identify risks and control measures.
-Dependency mappings: Interconnected systems and how everything is dependent on something else. (Ron's tool can help with this also.) Also the ability to update such a mapping when they change. Can this be automated?
-Regular review of contact list; quarterly check of accuracy/task passed along to admin assistance. Systems Support will send out a note each semester to contacts on Big Brother, but a broader list may be necessary.
-Standard maintenance versus non-routine maintenance/widepsread impact versus minor impact; procedures established to notify all concerned (in addition to calendar posting) IN CASE something goes wrong. Engineering Change Order (ECO) process was brought up; planned events are discussed regularly there.
-3a. Who should be involved in setting schedules? Reps from major areas (included in this meeting) should be involved.
-Would such a group replace existing groups (ED Advisory/ECO/CNS&CC/AIS Technical group meetings)? No, would be a representative, coordination group. Dates chosen by other groups would need to be tentative only until reviewed by coordination group and priorities set in the case of conflicts. This would help with scheduling activities coincidentally to keep service availability high.
-3b. Who outside IT needs to be involved in setting schedule?
-No one; groups will be charged with ensuring their users' needs are accommodated during the discussion and deliberation. The Facilities group is particularly important in this area as they deal with folks outisde of IT who have equipment within the ISB Data Center. Tentative dates are sent out and feedback is requested for negotiations.
-Once schedule is set, Public Relations group decides how to publicize with input from coordination group.
-3c. Conflict resolution?
-Associate VPs; once coordinated calendar is available, conflicts will be very apparent, and most can be solved before they need to go to that level, so would be few and far between.
-3d. End-user schedules accommodated?
-This will be dealt with at the existing group level and so tentative/recommended date *should* have taken this into account before it's suggested. Add this to a checklist for the decision process. Need access to a definitive calendar for outside of IT events (DBMS already does this.)
-Fast-track notification issues: What about planned events that have very short planning horizons? Should this be treated more like emergency events? How far out do we need to plan? 2 weeks? Process for initiation of downtime whether schedule is very short term or long term. Process would identify how to and who to notify so engineers can know how to proceed. Proactive versus reactive.