Presented by Mary Visser at the JISC Future of Research Conference, 19th October 2010

1. IT Services Attract the best and save costs: centralise your IT support for research?Mary VisserDirector IT, University of LeicesterJISC Future of Research Conference19th Oct 2010 www.le.ac.uk

2. Agenda The starting point Drivers for change Where we need to be The 1 minute strategy for getting there

3. A fragmented picture – circa 2008

4. Why researchers want change… Research process is different now It’s no longer just about STEM subjects Basics must be ‘free at the point of use’ (Funders won’t pay FEC for these) Cross-boundary collaboration shouldn’t be this hard!

5. Why VCs should want change…. Risk to data security is unacceptable Can’t afford the electricity bill Can’t afford to employ an expert on every technology under the sun Must exploit server virtualisation

6. Where we need to be

7. Researchers supported at every stage... Communication & Collaboration

8. With help winning and managing grants...... Pre-Award Costing (LUCRE) Enable PIs to build grant application using actual costs of staff, overheads, and the right funder rules Automatically trigger involvement of IT to help as necessary Grants Management Help PIs to keep track of finances during project

9. With help managing data.... A new breed – the ‘IT Research Liaison Manager’ Data Management advice and guidance Early career training If you are lucky, cross-disciplinary skills transfer

10. With access to computational power.... High Performance Computing

11. With generic hosting services.... High capacity, affordable data storage and archive LINUX / Windows platform hosting Database hosting

12. With help recording information for REF... Research Activity Tracking

13. With help publishing..... Leicester Research Archive A digital repository of research outputs

14. With help collaborating.... Web publishing, the VRE.....

15. The 1 minute strategy(After machiavelli)

16. Win credibility.... Run a professional Service Desk – do not pass go til you can answer the phone! The clue’s in the title of the team… ‘Research Computing Services’ ‘IT Research Liaison’ Employ IT people who have done research Do something useful for the influential A new HPC facility Pilot hosting services

17. Add governance....

18. Apply scare tactics.. Ask the auditors to find out how research data is being managed Analyse the total institutional cost of IT Present options for containing costs Academic freedom is not free!

19. Implement the strategy...... Build the infrastructure for a local cloud Identity management Data and voice network Virtualised servers / storage / backup / monitoring tools Two ‘good enough’ data centres Take the opportunities to centralise staffing and standardise Outsource anything that is well bounded and understood 5 Years!

20. Questions?