ITANA Capability Map

Below is the ITANA.org capability map. A Capability Map captures the core activities of an organization. The four strategic capabilities for ITANA.org are: Practice Development, Knowledge Transfer, Community Building and Outreach. These are the outcomes that we want ITANA.org to deliver to community. The other capabilities describe the services that we provide, how people connect with ITANA.org and finally the services that are supporting our activities.

For lessons learned from creating this map, see Jim's Leadership Lessons from Capability Mapping.

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Strategic Capabilities

The strategic capabilities describe the goals of ITANA. These are the outcomes that we want ITANA to deliver.

Practice Development

This capability drives the improvement and/or formalization of the practice of architecture as it relates to higher education. The outcomes for this capability include: ITANA would be seen as a driver and catalyst for the practice of architecture across higher education, institutions are following the best practices as defined by ITANA and there is a suite of tools and training materials available to members and institutions.

Knowledge Transfer

This capability drives the sharing of lessons-learned and best-practices between experts and the members and between the members themselves. The outcomes for this capability include: a repository of knowledge that the members draw upon to better their own practice, a suite of educational and informational opportunities for the members and a variety of opportunities and channels for members to share their knowledge with each other.

Community Building

The Community Building capability is what builds links between members of ITANA, forms peer-groups and mentoring relationships and builds the overall membership of ITANA. The outcomes for Community Building are: a growing list of active participants, both individual and institutional, in ITANA; members building an active network with each other and finding peers and mentors for their own growth and ITANA building a rich set of members who come together to form various working groups.

Outreach

Outreach is the final capability. Outreach includes communication plans that push value of architecture out to leadership and campus peers. Outreach also handles ITANA relationship with other groups such as EDUCAUSE, Internet2, The Open Group and vendors. The outcomes from a good outreach capability are: a broad understanding of ITANA’s role in higher education, leadership that understands the value of architecture and good relationships with vendors and other organizations.

Service Capabilities

The service capabilities describe the services ITANA delivers to the community. These are the methods that we ITANA uses to meet the Strategic Capabilities and to support the Community Facing Capabiliteis.

Collaboration

This capability is the basis for all of ITANA’s work. We are collaboration organization. Collaboration is at the heart of all of our goals. To that end, ITANA supports a suite of collaboration tools: email lists, wiki space, conference calls, Screen2Screen sessions and Face2Face meetings. We work to build cross-institutional collaborative working groups for various topics of interest. All of ITANA’s efforts are collaborations.

Content Creation

ITANA’s main delivery method is through content creation. We create wiki pages and presentations. In the coming year, look for more formalized content creation processes. Our ability to create meaningful content will be the core of supporting Outreach, Knowledge Transfer and Practice Development. We will also look at delivering a variety of types of content including more formal publications, lecture capture and webinars.

Instruction

Instruction is a newly formalized capability for ITANA. Previously, instruction had been ad hoc and informal. Going forward, more formalized short tutorials, on-line courses and possibly Face2Face courses will be an important part of our strategy. If we are going to support Knowledge Transfer fully, we will need to begin more instructional activities. Instruction will also be important for the mentoring and peer-group building part of the Community Building Capability.

Networking

ITANA has always had a role in bringing architects together and helping them find peers across higher education. We will continue to deliver this capability. Over the next year, will focus on formalizing peer-groups (e.g. “New To Higher Education” and “New Architects”) and building mentoring relationships.

Supporting Capabilities

The supporting capabilities describe the services that ITANA uses to run the organization. These are the back-office capabilities. They are the basic functions that are needed to hold meetings, capture and manage content and maintain the membership and relationships to other organziations.

Scheduling

Scheduling includes everything from bi-weekly conference calls to Face2Face meetings. It includes arranging phone bridge times, social media meet-ups and hangouts. It covers events that include the whole ITANA membership (like the Face2Face meetings) and work-group activities. Scheduling may be done centrally or by individual teams.

Content Management

ITANA creates content in a variety of tools: website, wiki, email lists, social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Google+, and more formal content like presentations and publications. Content Management keeps the content organized in each site and helps with the flow of content across the sites.

Capture

Content is created in a variety of ways for ITANA. There are minutes from bi-weekly calls, notes captured during Screen2Screen session and Face2Face notes and action items. Capture will expand to include lecture-capture type activities of on-line courses or local events.

Relationship Management

ITANA must maintain a variety of relationships. We maintain a tight relationship to our sponsors, EDUCAUSE and Internet2. We need to manage the membership across multiple platforms. Finally, we manage relationships to vendors, other organizations and institutions.

Community Facing Capabilities

The Community Facing Capabilities capture the channels that ITANA uses to connect with its members and to meet the outreach strategy. These capabilities list the ways that information flows from ITANA out to the members and partners and the ways that the member can engage with ITANA.

Meetings

The meetings capability is filled by both formal Face-to-Face meetings (we call them Face2Face), by webinars (Screen2Screen), by conference calls and by social networking meet-ups. The variety of meeting types allows us to serve different group sizes and content types and to support dynamic scheduling for work-groups and ad hoc discussions.

Collaboration Spaces

ITANA has a presence in a variety of collaboration tools and spaces. The current spaces include this website/blog, the wiki, and the EDUCAUSE email list. Other spaces are covered under the Social Networking Capability. Since ITANA is a collaborative effort by design, collaboration spaces and this capability are critical to our success. We must have a great strategy for creating and managing these spaces and for connecting the members with the right resources.

Publications

Publication has been informal and ad hoc for ITANA in the past. We have published wiki pages and blog posts and we created presentations. With the growth in ITANA and the desire to broaden the outreach effort, more formal publications (white papers, captured presentations and articles) will be an important portion of our strategy going forward. Publications will continue to include a wide variety of artifacts and types of publications. Informal publications from working groups still play a critical role but formal publications will grow.

Social Networking

Social Networking is critical to our strategic capabilities. It plays an important role in Outreach by pushing the messages and artifacts of ITANA out to a broad audience. It is vital to internal Community Building by allowing members to form relationships and learn about each other’s interests and activities, and it is critical to knowledge transfer by providing a variety of communications channels for members to learn about resources and activities. A more tightly knit Social Network strategy is needed as we move forward.

Courses

Courses are a new and important capability for ITANA. They are crucial in Knowledge Transfer, Practice Development and Community Building. Courses will need to cover a variety of topics and styles. They should include everything from more formal short-courses possibly taught by experts from our Business Schools, to short on-line tutorials created by the members. This is an interesting area for ITANA to focus on over the next year.