Growing the Innovation Team at CSU

I'm extremely pleased to announce that I am recruiting for an Assistant Director for Innovation. This person will work as a partner with me to build the innovation function at the Cal State Chancellor's Office in Long Beach. Some of the details appear below, but for full information, and to apply, visit this link and then select the Assistant Director for Innovation position. Please share this information with anyone you know who might be interested. I'm hoping very much for an interesting and diverse pool of candidates. Applications will be accepted at least through September 7. And yes, the position does require you to be in Long Beach. - Michael

		Position DescriptionThe California State University, Office of the Chancellor, is seeking an Assistant Director for Innovation to be responsible for the overall development, integration, and management of the innovation programs. The Assistant Director will deliver efforts that will develop, support and enhance the innovation program that spans the California State University. Some of the duties assigned to the Assistant Director include oversight of the development and implement strategy and programming, researching trends in innovation, managing resources, and assuring timely and accurate communication regarding innovation programs. This position will be the primary liaison between the Chancellor's Office and systemwide campuses regarding events, accounting and policies and procedures.
	Responsibilities
		Under the general direction of the Chief Innovation Technology Officer/Deputy CIO the Assistant Director for Innovation will:-Provide guidance and counsel, oversee and develop a wide range of innovative programs and services, analyze the effectiveness of, and make recommendations for, future programs; -Design, implement and evaluate mini-grant programs; -Synthesize existing quantitative and qualitative data to estimate current offerings, identify themes, and inform future work including strategy and design; -Independently execute and administer day-to-day assessment activities in collaboration with the Chief Innovation Technology Officer/Deputy CIO; -Collaborate with others to help resolve program issues and concerns, interpret policies, and mediate complex and sensitive issues; -Oversee and manage funds provided for innovation programs and projects, tracking expenditures and providing timely reports/information to the Chief Innovation Technology Officer/Deputy CIO; -Lead virtual and in-person meetings with campus innovators to support and promote their activities; -Lead, create and contribute to the development of business practices regarding the innovation programs; -Develop and maintain systemwide community relationships by providing guidance and fostering support among the campuses in support of innovation; -Design, implement and develop polls and other research instruments, collect and analyze the data, present results to senior management and others including campus CIO; -Monitor trends in innovation and technology and keep Chief Innovation Technology Officer/Deputy CIO informed; -Write, edit. and publish articles and blogs relating to campus innovations as well as issues and technologies of interest to campus innovators; -Develop and implement social media strategy to promote the innovation activities; -Lead, design, organize and execute meetings and seminars that encourage innovation across the university; -Collaborate in design planning and innovation forecasting sessions with the Chief Innovation Technology Officer/Deputy CIO and other ITS and campus personnel; -Develop and manage the process of scoping, evaluating, and awarding mini-grants and other campus support; oversee the campus mini grant budgets and documentation and dissemination to assure appropriate use of funds; -Other additional activities as needed in support of the Chief Innovation Technology Officer/Deputy CIO.
	Qualifications
		This position requires: -A bachelor's degree from an accredited institution in any field, or equivalent combination of education and related experience, is required. -5+ years of experience in an area such as project management, information technology, software development, communication, instructional design, or similar. -Experience in higher education is desirable. -A Master's degree in a field related to innovation, technology, or the arts is desirable. -Polished written and oral communication skills to address a wide variety of audiences. -Strong writer, creative problem-solver, and nuanced thinker who is flexible, adaptable, and insightful with the ability to manage both the big picture vision and the day-to-day details of a project. -Able to work successfully with a high degree of independence in a complex organization and ability to work simultaneously on multiple projects with different timeliness, managers, stakeholders, and scopes. -Excellent writing skills, including the ability to write and edit in various formats and for multiple audiences required. -Ability to build communities of diverse individuals to work together to achieve common goals is required. -Excellent verbal communication skills and ability to listen well to others required. -Tech-savvy and proficient with online platforms and survey instruments. A high degree of facility with technology tools, such as Google Suite, Microsoft Office, Slack, Smartsheet, Photoshop, Qualtrics, and data analysis and management programs required. -A general understanding of technology trends including advanced innovation is required. -Ability to make intelligent use of social media tools required. -Experience managing budgets required. -Experience designing, developing and maintaining websites using WordPress and similar tools desirable. -Understanding of design thinking principles and ability to lead design and innovation sessions desirable. -Able to cultivate and sustain collaborative relationships with colleagues and partners working across cohorts and departments. -Receptive and responsive to feedback and able to conduct analyses and offer a range of viable, contextualized options. -Ability to communicate visually through drawing and graphic design desirable.
	Application Period
		Resumes will be accepted until September 7, 2018 or until job posting is removed.

A Return to Embodied Labs

When we last visited Embodied Labs, they had just moved from Chicago to a house in LA, they had just published their first VR title Alfred (simulating Alzheimer's Disease and Macular Degeneration) and they had yet to prove that their concept of using VR to develop empathy in care givers would really work and find a market. What a difference a year makes!  

Founders Carrie Shaw & Thomas Leahy at the LA office of Embodied Labs

Of course, as founder and CEO Carrie Shaw says, they are living in Start-Up Years, where one calendar year is like 18 years of a normal life! 

Embodied Labs has a second title on the market and is just about to launch a third, Clay, dealing with the experience that patients and their families go through at end of life. I got a chance to preview it at their office on LA's Miracle Mile and it's just as intense as it sounds. Carrie and Thomas are having discussions with educators about how to prepare students for this experience and how to debrief them afterwards. Not surprisingly, many of those who have seen Clay have been brought to tears after embodying the mind of a man going through the last few months, and then the last moments of his life.

In the last year Embodied Labs has contracted to provide their software to a number of institutions to help caregivers develop understanding and empathy for the experience of their patients. They are also very interested in working with education institutions to use their software in the curriculum, and also to partner with faculty to research the impact and effectiveness of their VR experiences. During the past semester, Associate Professor Jaime Hannans at Cal State Channel Islands used the Alfred Alzheimer's simulation with her nursing students, and reported very promising results.

Embodied Labs has also received recognition from several quarters, including XR Education Prize of $250,000 funded by the Gates Foundation. I'm glad to see their fan club growing because I think their work is very high quality, quite innovative, and has the potential to be one of the most impactful applications of immersive reality for education. We had fun talking about possible future directions but for now they are focused on the health care industry, which is of course one of the fastest growing parts of the economy.

We've agreed that I will visit again in another year - or is it 18?

Breaking Through the Software Purchasing Logjam

Frictionless purchasing? The AmazonGo store in Seattle

Over the past year I've visited a number of Cal State campuses, and had the chance to ask the question "How can we be helping you more at the Chancellor's Office"? A number of themes emerged, but the one issue that came up nearly everywhere is the high cost of procurement, particularly for software. ITS and Procurement have been working together to try to provide system-wide purchases or MEAs for the most broadly used and expensive software, but what about the dozens or hundreds of titles purchased every year at CSU campuses?

The Problem

Whether a software license is $100, $10,000, or $100,000, due diligence requires that we consider all of the following:

1. Accessibility - to what extent does the use of the software present challenges for our student and employee populations with a range of abilities that may require the use of a screen reader, prevent the use of a mouse, or many other accessibility issues? And how will we mitigate these issues to assure every student can be educated and every staff member can do their job?
2. Security - what information is collected? Where does it go? To the extent that the software requires the use of personal information, how is it protected? Where and how is it stored? What risks do we assume by adopting this software title?
3. Contract Terms and Conditions - are the T&C's consistent with state and University requirements? What risk do we assume when we adopt this software?
4. Integration into the IT environment - can this software work in our labs? Will it require SSO? PeopleSoft integration?

And... after all those other considerations, if we have time we might ask "is this software the best choice to solve the problem? do we know if it actually works?"

The result is lots of work for IT staff, accessibility experts, and procurement departments. Either we go through these steps diligently, requiring lots of staff time, or we (or members of the campus community) find a way to sidestep the whole thing - which has the potential to create real risk and negative consequences. And not only does a comprehensive process take staff time, it also frustrates our end users who, from their perspective have a long wait to get software purchased - which from their point of view, understandably, is evidence of incompetence on the part of IT or procurement or both.

A Solution?

As part of the CalState Innovate program, and in partnership with Cal State Fullerton and Procurement at the Chancellor's Office, we're exploring the creation of a portal to assist campuses with the workflow required to approve a software purchase, and to provide a central repository to share all the associated documentation. There's really not a way to eliminate all the work required to properly vet a software title, BUT what if we could just do it once? That's the goal of our proof of concept, which was built using a product called Learn Platform. Sound interesting? I'll be presenting our work, along with Karl Rectanus, the founder of Learn, at the CMS Tech Conference last week of July 2018 in Sacramento. Join us there, and watch for more information in the near future. I'm looking forward to sharing our ideas and hearing yours.

Virtual Reality in real life

As part of my efforts to connect the CSU to promising innovations in Virtual Reality, I recently had the chance to visit the founder of Embodied Labs, Carrie Shaw. She and two of start-up team Ryan Lebar and Thomas Leahy have just relocated to Los Angeles from Chicago, living in a house on the west side of LA and quickly acclimating to the California lifestyle.

Embodied Labs taking a break to enjoy LA

Embodied Labs was developed to use VR to build empathy by putting a person in the "body" of another person so you can see the world as they do. Carrie was motivated by the personal experience of seeing caretakers for her mother - who has Alzheimer's Disease - have trouble understanding how she sees the world. Among other problems, her mother has a visual deficit that makes her blind to objects on the left side. Using clear lenses and tape, Carrie developed a simple tool that she found to be effective for helping new caretakers better understand her mother's needs and to enable them to provide better care.

Carrie modeling her DIY VR

Embodied has completed one immersive piece - you can see a 2D version on YouTube but it's much more powerful and realistic in the 3D VR version which is very well-produced. Embodied has a several more simulations at various places in their production pipeline, and is building an interesting platform with a smooth user experience that has potential to provide experiences in a number of different areas.

One of the questions that comes up over and over again is "does VR really make a difference?" Embodied Labs created an experimental design to measure the impact of a pilot at University of Illinois - Chicago, as described in this whitepaper.  They are currently undertaking additional pilots while they simultaneously develop new materials. They have also developed a standardized equipment list which I thought might be useful in other contexts as well - you can find it here. If  any CSU campuses are interested in their approach or would like to explore the possibility of a pilot, I would be glad to connect you.

Focus on Campus Innovation: Minigrants

In May, we announced the availability of $10,000 grants to support campus innovation, and early in June we released the list of nine proposals that have been funded for Fall 2017. We received more than 30 proposals from IT and Academic Technology Staff, as well as from faculty. Innovation areas included improving the student experience, exploring virtual reality, and improving the efficiency of technology deployment and support.

Congratulations to all the minigrant recipients! We will be looking forward with anticipation to see what they can accomplish over the next six months.

• Mihaela Popescu, San Bernardino: Supporting Faculty-Student Collaboration for Producing Engaging Virtual Reality Instructional Content
• Ben Quillian, Northridge: DIY Technology Support Using Artificial Intelligence (AI)
• Amir Dabirian, Fullerton: Titanium Engagement (Moodle Dashboard)
• Jennifer Redd, San Jose: Supporting Faculty Exploration of Virtual and Augmented Reality
• Peter F. Young, San Jose: Diving Deeper into the Story... Much deeper than just 360 degrees
• Ranjit Philip, Northridge: Technology Services to Support Academic Research using AWS Institutional Framework
• Orlando Leon, Fresno: Mobile Student Intranet
• Teresa Macklin, San Marcos: On-Demand System Provisioning
• Srikanth Danapal, San Francisco: Natural Language Processing Artificial Intelligence Chabot

ITAC Survey Results - (part two of two)

The web site for CSU Innovate includes four areas of focus:

• Redesigning the Student Experience
• Cloud Migration
• Visual Interface
• Collaboration at a Distance

Of these areas, the first two areas generated the most consistent interest levels from the respondents - a mean of 4.3/5 for student experience and 4.5/5 for cloud migration. The later two areas, while of interest to many ITAC members, had significantly lower means (3.3/5 for both). 

As shown here, the topic interest for the Student Experience focus was quite scattered.

However, the cloud migration area elicited a clear interest in the development of cloud architectures. 

When asked to "Define innovation in the context of CSU technology in one or two sentences", answers included:

Clearly, there's a lot of opportunity here. Thanks to everyone who offered their thoughts. Keep them coming! A summary of the full survey results can be found at this link:

CSU Innovate Survey Analytics

ITAC Survey Results - (part one of two)

Word cloud from the "additional comments" section of the survey, produced using voyant-tools,org

In March I surveyed ITAC (the IT leaders from the 23 CSU campuses) to solicit their guidance on the goals and tactics they would like to see employed to promote innovation in the CSU. IT leaders or their designees from 13 of the campuses completed the survey.

First, I asked them about time horizons. Overall, the preference was for a fairly near-term focus as shown here.

I was a bit surprised by this, as one usually thinks of innovation looking further into the future, but clearly a lot of campuses are looking at help thinking about the changes they need to make in the next two years. However, while the consensus on time horizon is skewed towards the near-term, the tolerance for risk in innovation was moderately high

I next asked the campus leaders how willing they would be to invest their own campus resources in innovation efforts. Given how challenging it can be to find resources on a CSU campus, I was very encouraged by the response.

Not surprisingly, nearly all campuses were interested in participating if additional resources could be provided centrally.

Next I asked about the potential areas for innovation focus. I've outlined these previously on the Cal State Innovate web site. I'll discuss these responses in my next blog post.