Between Semesters

Since i've resigned from work, i'm a full time student. its 20 days until class restarts. I know i can prep for a course in a week so I have downtime. its going to be over 100 for the high temps here for a bit so outside work is limited. (I love August in TX). My wonderful spouse works in IT, so I am starting my ITIL Foundation course. I am going to see if i can schedule the test this friday or monday.

I chose this course since a lot of employers seem to want this level cert. I get to the be the guinea pig and find the material and study and take the test and relay what i learn to my spouse (and in case someone is reading along, i don't reveal the questions. Its amazing how often I just confirm, yes, the syllabus does cover all the material). Anyhow, getting the formal learning

Yes, we have some geeky conversations. She's Service Desk (plus with some network exp). I was Technical (network) plus managerial. Tonight, why would you update the firmware on a printer...Wow.

WGU Semester 1 Complete Recap

I transferred in about 30-40 hours. I'm in the last 3 weeks of the semester and cannot be issued additional classes. I thought I'd recap semester 1 courses. I completed 27 hours while working. Please understand I have over 15 years experience in a wide breadth of technology so some of this was a refresher.

A+ test courses: the material was good. Plenty sufficient. I'm glad I have nearly 2 decades of experience to answer a few of the questions. I'd recommend actually setting up some wifi routers....All the other sims were good.

The CIW intro course and the web programming: Again, the study material is more than sufficient. At least the material you learn here can be reused the in the MS MTA course regarding style sheets, html, and scripting.

MS-intro program course. As always, the material was sufficient. I didn't get section 2. i used the lynda videos. Re-read the chapters again.

Critical thinking course. I see why my mentor said some people hate this course. You actually have to use logic and thinking skills. There is some memorization. Not a bad course really. I kind of enjoyed it.

Biology. imagine cramming for a standard bio course for a single final. As always, the material was sufficient. I watched the videos. Read the material twice. I know I did well.

Exams -- two types, vendor and at home. The vendor ones are at a certification center. I have cert center close that works closely with WGU. Works very well. I tend to call the center the day of or the day before my test. The other is the web cam test. It feels weird knowing someone is watching you. I mouth the questions when i dont know the answers and haven't had any proctor issues. The only thing that gets me here is that it take 72-96 hours before you can take the test once you register. So, I have to plan a bit more so I'm ready but not over-ready for the test.

Pre-Exam -- I use the practice tests HEAVILY. Not for just the answer to the question, but to all the question options. Do I know what the wrong answer would be right for? I typically take them full battery of questions at least twice. I read fairly quick so i can do a test bank of 200 in a reasonable amount of time. It wears me out, but i typically do questions and show answers the first time. i want to know what the answer is and why it is right. Most of the practice material will tell you what the other answers really mean. I take time to study all both the right and wrong answers.

My Mentor -- Everyone at WGU gets a mentor. I get to talk to mine weekly. She is very nice and encouraging. She also replies to emails quickly. Shes there to support me and help me if I need it. I'm glad she's there. its good to have someone else care. She is also responsible for starting the process to take the actual test. Since i've done well, she releases the assessment portion so I can sign up for the tests.

Message boards -- I use the message boards. Every class has them. I recommend that you at least check them out. someone has likely had your question and if not the course mentors will answer it. Some will provide you alternative material or what to focus your studies on. A very good resource. I usually check it before I begin studying the actual course material.

So far, I've enjoyed the experience. The material is good. The resources are there. Its not always easy. Lots of saturdays and sundays studying with a a test Monday morning...

Full Time Student

I recently resigned my position of IT Director to...become a full time student at WGU. There had been a few positions I applied for that my lack of degree held me back. Its time to fix that problem. I could have stayed and been a part time student, but the circumstances would have made that difficult. In addition, most of the courses at WGU are certs I had formerly held so that will help speed the studying along. The goal is to finish in the spring or summer of 2015. 60ish hours to go.

Writing Policy

Okay, i am techie. I don't like writing policies. Its simple as that. I find policies difficult. Not necessarily to write, but to find the balance the institutions requirements along with the "humans" who will be interacting with the things which i'm writing policy. My human side always plays the what-ifs. the grey areas. ugh.

So, we are writing our lost and stolen and replacement device policy. Finance liked it minus some Financial language! easily remedied. waiting on legal and HR. Something about with holding a last paycheck until we get our gear back. The goal is to either get our gear back or withhold the cost of the units said staff member failed to return. Simple enough. However, that means our paperwork has to be in order. teacher A is owner of laptop X and ipad y. Fun! more paperwork! (yes, we have tools to tie the devices to the users. YEAH KACE!).

Week 1 Totals

Well, I ran our last 7 days of work orders totals. OMG! Wow.

1240 work orders closed in a week.
High water was around 1000 open work orders
current total is around 650 open requests
highest daily request was 400 work orders. doing the total on this day was sad. we close 275 requests and got 400.

(for those of you who don't know the pattern of k-12..here goes. In early June, turn everything off and store it...somewhere. and that somewhere is likely only conditioned down to 90-95 degrees. then, in the last week of august, find said stored items. turn them on and hope they work. Remember, some of the teachers turning these items on don't "know" technology. its a magic box. we are ok with that. getting the little 2nd grader to complete a task can be magic to me too. she does her magic with the kids, my team does our magic with the devices).

Thats pretty good from what for us. 38 sites, 3500 staff users. new ipads. We have a pretty good support staff who understands getting everyone up and running is job 1. We are on the second wave of requests, its works, but i can't do X. Access youtube, run adobe pro, etc. these are the more complex problems where unfortunately "no" becomes an answer.

Inheritances

I didn't know what to title this...inheritances or victims of our success. Anyhow, I might brag or show some bravado, but I think my team is pretty good at what we do with what we have.

Last year we inherited badge access control our buildings. All I got was another help desk staff. I think I made out like a champ. Sad? Maybe, but she's really good! anyhow, Security access, awesome?! Why? Well, people have this notion we solve problems in our department and 3 months to change a badge access was too long. Who'dathunkit? So now this is my beast to manage as of last year.

Its now year 1+ of owning access control. It is the start of school, and badge access is my disaster to deal with. Its not technically a disaster, it just is something we have to take care of. we hire 10-15% new staff per year and move another 10-25% around. 40 sites, 3500 staff. Yep, its not pretty right now. So, our access control systems don't work well for our customers. Yeah, we've identified the underlying problem(s), our connections to HR systems, etc, but the customer doesn't care. Ms. Teacher gets pissed her badge doesn't work on the door. We GET it. we get pissed too. Hell, i set off the alarm and call security when my doesn't work. (hello, security, i'm the the building. i set off the alarm. i'll be here for 2 hrs. I'm guessing my badge doesn't work on the way out either so you'll have to set it). We get 100 work order per day for badge access now. They get resolved quickly, but having a door not open when you badge it pisses everyone off. Its that simple. Trying to educate bosses and customers, that 700 open active work orders aren't -that bad- is a task. Last year we peaked at 1200. I'm guessing 2000 this year will be the peak.

I'm sure there is a moral to the story. I think it is integrate your systems. I've met with HR. They are willing to help. there are good software solutions to help update all systems quickly. There is budget. Now, can we get the people part to work.

Deploying 600 iPads to Teachers in a Single Day (& 1800 in 6 days)

We deployed 600 ipads in a single day and 1800 in a week. Here's a brief outline. 

1. Project Scope Prep
1. Our deployment event was only to hand-out the device with a minimal configuration. Training would come later. The basic items we would do were
1. Connect the iPad/Customer to wireless via user account (no SCEP). We wanted location services on wireless to be useful
2. Connect the iPad/Customer to our MDM solution. 
3. Connect the iPad/Customer to mail
4. Connect the customer to his/her own iTunes account
5. Document Customer and iPad association along with CSR who took care of the customer. 
2. iPad Prep (4 weeks)
1. Inventory Control
1. Received and inventoried 2300 ipads.
2. Brought asset tags into asset management system for tracking
2. "Image Prep"
1. Non-managed deployment model so individual itunes accounts can be used.
2. Only app loaded was work order app and MDM catalog
3. Minimal security prep (we trust 'em with our kids, so a piece of electronics is a no brainer)
4. Charge the iPads to over 85% before storing. 2 weeks storage didn't drop the battery much.
3. Location Prep (1 day physically prepping, weeks diagramming)
1. We obtained one of middle schools gyms. Seating capacity was 420.
2. Parking lot could hold about 120 vehicles
3. We diagramed the traffic flow. It was white-boarded. and re-whiteboarded. 
1. Since it was August in Texas -- kept everyone inside as much as possible
2. Found the "slow" part would be the actual customer to (customer service rep) CSR interaction on the configuration. We would go at our customers pace. We allocated 20 CSR here.
3. We borrowed stantions (crowd control pole things with ropes) from food service for customer routing within the cafe.
4. We had it catered on day 1. Hey, if they wait, feed and water 'em! Plus if they had to bring kids, we could send the kid home on a sugar high.
5. We brought 3 temporary APs to connect since the most customers we had per half hour was 50. 3+2 in the ceiling is 5 APs. Should handle 100ish clients. If you are a wireless geek saying what about everyone bringing phones and your CSR stations, yeah we know
6. We hard cabled our CSR locations with temporary switches and connections. 
7. The staff at the building we used were AMAZING! custodians, office staff, food service, coaches, everyone was great. 
4. Staffing Prep
1. We did just-in time training. Literally the day before. Took 4 hours to prep the CSRs.
1. How to enter a work order
2. How to connect wifi
3. how to connect to MDM
4. how to check email
5. how to connect itunes
6. what to do when something goes wrong
1. We had 2 "senior floaters" that could _hopefully_ resolve 90% of the issues. Typical issues were
1. Customer (teacher) wasn't in work order system. (import in)
2. Customer password -- reset at CSR location.
1. CSR's were granted pwd reset abilities
3. Customer was dropping wifi (quick solution -- wifi white list)
4. MDM certificate corruption (new ipad, or profile removal)
5. iPad flaked -- replace.
6. Customer asks for training or more hands-on or beyond the scope of the deployment questions.
1. PUNT -- we had our instructional tech team available to answer these questions. Again. these people were awesome during the roll-out.
7. Customer doesn't have iTunes account. We create. Use internal email. The customer had 3 weeks to get it done if they wanted a separate account. 
2. Instructional Staff Prepping
1. Gave them assigned stations. The lead for this team took this off my plate after we walk-through the diagram several times. She allocated her staff to the right spots.
1. Greeters
2. Q & A tables
3. Floaters (help where needed)
3. Misc Staff Prepping (not much here to prep)
1. Paperwork runners -- ran tickets to CSR
2. Restockers -- made sure there were iPads for the CSR
3. Clean up folks -- 600 ipads and case generate trash. Boxes, film, ..just trash.
5. Advertising & Customer Scheduling
1. Used our teacher training registration tool to advertise to teachers
2. Also sent email to campus admins in case some teachers didn't receive email.
3. Locked sessions at 50 per half hour starting at 9AM. Left 90 minute break for lunch. 12 sessions total. 
1. Walk-ins were permitted. We actually did 622 day 1. 
6. Work Flow Processing
1. Greet the customer at the doors near the gym and cafe! Tell them where to go next. (1 person)
2. Hand customer Acceptable use policy/device loan policy. Actual signature page was part of work order (1 person)
1. There is food & water here if we get back logged along with seating. We found it was used by spouses and kids. 
3. Verify employment and/or enrollment. I'm trusting...to a point. (2 people)
1. State ID
2. District ID so we can tell job roles. Teachers were the primary recipient, not admins. Turning away principals and APs is always fun. They were actually understanding so it wasn't bad.
4. Hostess station (2 people). Watches CSR stations and maintains customer list. Hostesses would seat customers and do a simple list like a restaurant. When a CSR came available, called the next customer. We had welcome to your iPad documents along with the Device Agreement documents to read while waiting.
1. We had "flags" for the CSR people to raise when they were done and awaiting another person.
5. CSR stations (16 -20 people). Configure the iPad as listed above.
1. Generate and print work order
1. Backside of work order has signature page for device agreement (sneaky?)
2. Configure iPad
3. Place iPad into case
4. Give customer iPad and Device Agreement page.
6. Q & A stations (2-4 people)
1. Staffed by instructional tech folks at tables.
7. Signature and copy area.
1. Mixed with the Q&A area. 
2. Sign the Usage agreement and make copies if customer wants
8. Departure station
1. Receive signed agreement paperwork
2. Give customer power cables for iPad

That's all it took. Advertising up and down the food chain was critical.

1) There were a lot of people who ensured our message was consistent. This is for teachers was a big deal. 

2) What to expect was a big deal. -- iPad deployment only, not training

3) Ability to put other projects on "hold" for 2 days