Assess the Maturity of Research Computing in Higher Education

Prioritize and elevate IT services to drive institutional excellence.

Analyst perspective

Create a shared vision for IT unity in education.

Executive summary

Your Challenge

• Research computing is caught between the interests of researchers and the priorities of central IT, which can at time create friction and governance challenges.
• Institutions struggle to coordinate an improvement plan in research computing capabilities.
• Different institutional types – from research-intensive to teaching-focused – have varying needs, but they lack a method of assessing and coordinating those needs.

Common Obstacles

• Limited frameworks for assessing research computing maturity specifically
• Competing priorities between central IT functions and research computing needs
• Difficulty in balancing investments across people, process, and technology dimensions
• Varying expectations across different types of institutions

Info-Tech’s Approach

• A comprehensive maturity assessment framework for university research computing
• A self-assessment tool customized to institutional type with actionable results
• A strategic roadmap using MoSCoW prioritization method
• KPI tracking to measure progress and demonstrate value

Info-Tech Insight

Eliminate wasted research computing investments by using this maturity assessment to identify and prioritize your most critical capability gaps.

Research IT requires specialized approaches and coordinated planning for institutional success

Research IT vs. central IT

• Different priorities: Research IT focuses on performance and innovation, while Enterprise IT emphasizes stability and standardization.
• Unique staffing needs: Research IT requires specialized roles and training, often misunderstood by traditional HR approaches.
• Decentralized management: Researchers frequently build ad hoc resources when institutional support is inadequate, creating security and efficiency challenges.
• Inconsistent effectiveness: Research computing practices vary widely across institutions with few universally adopted management approaches.
• Funding structure challenges: Historical federal funding models placed research computing outside central campus management, creating fragmentation.

Low staffing levels

• 55% of central IT organizations have < 1 FTE dedicated to research support.
• 78% of research-focused institutions have < 7 people from central IT supporting research.

Unsustainable budget models

• 50% of institutions lack a sustainable budget model for research IT.
• 32.3% report their funding model for research computing serves them poorly.

Source: Blustain, Harvey, with Sandra Braman, Richard N. Katz, and Gail Salaway.

The differences between central and research IT can lead to uncoordinated efforts

Challenges in research computing improvement planning

• Limited strategic planning expertise: Smaller institutions and emerging research IT organizations often lack experience and resources to develop effective analysis frameworks.
• Communication barriers: Absence of common vocabulary across research IT community hinders coordinated planning efforts.
• Capability assessment gaps: Research IT Capabilities Model helps identify current strengths and weaknesses but requires follow-through.
• Priority implementation disconnect: Identifying improvement areas doesn't automatically translate to actionable coverage improvements.
• Insufficient long-term planning: Many institutions, including research-focused ones, don't consistently plan for future IT research support needs.

Integration with research processes is lacking:

• Central IT is "never" or "rarely" consulted in the pre-award process of grants in 40% of institutions.
• Central IT is "never" or "rarely" consulted in the faculty hiring process in two-thirds of institutions.

Source: Blustain, Harvey, with Sandra Braman, Richard N. Katz, and Gail Salaway.

A specialized assessment of research IT ensures effective support for university missions

Focus on the specific needs of research IT

Benefits of specialized assessment:

• Support for university mission: Optimizing IT means optimizing both the administration mission and the research mission to lead to outcomes that align with the overall university mission.
• Visualization of strengths and weaknesses: The maturity assessment provides a heat map view to help institutions visualize their strengths and weaknesses in research IT support.
• Prioritization based on researcher needs: Institutions can mark areas as "priorities" based on the needs of their researchers, ensuring focused efforts on critical areas.
• Strategic planning and resource justification: Institutions can use the results for strategic planning which in turn can support program funding and grant proposals.

Limitations of general IT assessments for research:

• Lack of specific focus: General IT assessments often lack the specific focus on research outcomes and the nuanced understanding of researcher needs that specialized research IT assessment methods provide.
• Broad focus of existing models: The research IT maturity assessment was developed because general IT capabilities models were considered too broadly focused and less specific than the specialized research IT assessment model.

Customize your research computing assessment for maximum impact

The outcome of this assessment is a customized roadmap aligned with your institution’s research mission and priority.

The assessment adapts to your organization's profile – from research-intensive universities to teaching-focused colleges, allowing you to create a customized roadmap aligned with your institution's mission, research intensity, and strategic priorities.

Advanced Research Computing Programs:

• Fine-tune specialized capabilities to maintain competitive edge
• Identify opportunities for cross-institutional collaborations

Established Research Computing Programs:

• Validate strengths and reveal unexpected capability gaps
• Optimize resource allocation across diverse research domains

Emerging Research Computing Programs:

• Establish baseline capabilities and identify critical gaps
• Prioritize foundational investments for maximum impact

Transforming Research Computing at William & Mary

A strategic approach to computational excellence

INDUSTRY

Higher Education

SOURCE

Interview

Challenge

Need for centralization: Research computing was fragmented, with multiple small clusters and varying levels of support.

Expansion of research focus: Transition from a liberal arts focus to STEM, requiring more computational resources to support the growing number of research projects in fields like data science, physics, and marine science.

Infrastructure limitations: Existing network bandwidth and storage capacity were insufficient for growing research demands.

Solution

Governance structure: Established a research computing advisory committee, including key researchers and the Vice Provost for Research.

Resource consolidation: Centralized multiple small clusters into larger, shared resources allowing for more efficient use of computational power. Increased storage capacity to support larger-scale research projects.

Strategic planning: Developed a strategic plan, aimed to align research computing with the university's broader strategic goals and ensure long-term sustainability.

Results

Enhanced collaboration: Improved coordination among researchers, IT staff, and administrative units. The centralized structure facilitated better communication and resource sharing.

Increased capacity: Upgraded network bandwidth from 1 gigabit to 10 gigabits, with a 40-gigabit backbone, and expanded storage capacity, supporting larger-scale research projects and computational needs.

Grant success: Secured federal funding for research computing infrastructure, boosting technical capacity and sustainability.

Use Info-Tech’s Management & Governance framework for research IT

The research IT maturity assessment is organized around Info-Tech’s Management & Governance framework for Small Enterprise.

Small Enterprise Management & Governance Framework for Research Computing in Academia

• The Small Enterprise Management & Governance (M&G) Framework is highly appropriate for research computing in academic institutions.
• It organizes 21 core processes across 5 domains, providing a structured approach to managing and governing IT operations.
• The framework strikes a balance between necessary focus and appropriate detail.
• Each of the 5 domains is further assessed by the dimensions of people, process, and technology, allowing technology leadership to quickly diagnose the critical issues.

Assess the maturity of research computing in higher education

Eliminate wasted research computing investments by using Info-Tech’s maturity assessment to identify and prioritize your most critical capability gaps.

1. Identify your key stakeholders to complete the assessment:
   • Research computing practitioners
   • Principal investigators & researchers
   • Central IT
   • Centers and institutes
   • Institutional leadership
2. Adapt the maturity assessment to suit the research focus of the institution:
   • Research essential
   • Balanced
   • Teaching favored
   • Teaching essential
3. Use the results to create a list of IT initiatives
4. Prioritize the initiatives using the MoSCoW framework and integrate them into your IT strategy.