On October 16th, members of IT attended the EDUCAUSE Annual Conference, a conference for professionals and technology providers in higher education. This year, the conference placed a focus on institutional resilience. The topic of institutional resilience has been made prominent by recent world events such as COVID-19, generative AI, cybersecurity breaches, and global instability. The ever-changing landscape of higher education serves as an opportunity for organizations to expand beyond growth and innovation to address risks; and to prepare for an unpredictable future.
During the conference, UBC IT’s Robotic Process Automation (RPA) team was highlighted as a Solution Spotlight for their focus on improving inefficiency in administrative processes. The RPA team has been crucial in helping the university streamline processes, data, and technology to allow time and capacity for teams to focus on higher-value tasks. This continuing effort is in pursuit of operational and financial resilience that would allow UBC to remain resilient as technology demands increase.
UBC CIO Jennifer Burns was quoted by EDUCAUSE on this topic:
"The University of British Columbia in Canada has invested in people and tools to implement a variety of automation projects. A new team in IT has been formed to use robotic process automation and business process automation software, along with lean process enhancement, to engineer inefficiency out of our administrative processes. An additional benefit besides cost savings is that this allows staff to focus on more meaningful activities, which have enhanced their work experience. We have implemented projects in both academic and administrative units, as well as within IT, to automate cybersecurity tasks as well as other previously manual activities."
Congratulations to UBC IT for being recognized by EDUCAUSE for their achievements!
Read the full article 2024 EDUCAUSE Top 10: Institutional Resilience
