A recent reorganization of our administrative services units provided an opportunity to re-imagine how we deliver information about our services.

Problem:
When examined as a collective, the web presence for our administrative services units is a mish-mash of more than 30 websites. They have had varying degrees of attention, from significant to minimal—one site has not been re-designed since 2003 (Do the math—that’s 15 years!). Another has a page referencing people who stopped working at the university more than five years ago.

Opportunity:
By using an integrated web strategy that uses the purpose of the content to determine its delivery channel, rather than the unit providing the service, we will be able to make it easier for our customers to find the information they need.

Currently, people are forced to know which unit provides the various services and then go to that unit’s website in order to find the information and services that they need to use. To eliminate this need, and to co-locate similar types of information, we proposed moving to a content type approach that integrates all the content for the portfolio and organizes it into broad categories that will inform its delivery channel.

This act of decoupling the content from the unit also helps future-proof the portfolio for further reorganizations.

Outcome:
Our presentation will focus on the successes and challenges we have faced to date when executing an integrated web strategy and how we are managing culture change required to make this successful.