The University of Oklahoma is truly an extraordinary institution, known for its academic excellence and strong sense of community. Attracting top students from across the nation and 106 countries around the world, OU consistently ranks first or second in the nation in National Merit Scholar enrollment per capita at American public universities and is in the top five of public universities in graduation of Rhodes Scholars. OU enrolls more than 30,000 students, has more than 2,000 full-time faculty members, and has an annual operating budget is more than $1 billion.

Award Winning OU IT Needed a Portfolio Management Solution

OU Information Technology (OU IT) supports the mission of the University of Oklahoma to provide the best possible educational experience for their students. As such, the staff of over 170 IT employees provides information technology services to diverse groups of students, faculty and over 11,000 employees of the university. This can be a daunting task! However, OU IT is consistently acknowledged as one of the best in the business with recent recognition as one of the “100 Best Places to Work in IT 2006” by ComputerWorld and one of the “Top 20 Wired Colleges” by PC Magazine. OU’s Chief Information Officer, Dennis Aebersold, was also named in the ComputerWold Premier 100 Information Technology Leaders.

At the center of it all is Eddie Huebsch, Director IT Projects Office. Mr. Huebsch is responsible for directing the management of a portfolio that includes hundreds of IT projects and resources. Previously, these projects were tracked and managed using a combination of spreadsheets and Microsoft® products including Project Server 2003 and Sharepoint. The organization faced many challenges and needed better visibility into their portfolio of IT projects. As Mr. Huebsch says, “We did not have the resources to manage requests, pipeline and projects in a streamlined portfolio. Each project stood individually, but was not organized into a manageable portfolio.”

Use of Portfolio Intelligence® Provides Project Visibility, Prioritization and Improved Resource Management

OU IT began searching for a project portfolio management solution in the Spring of 2006. Their objective was to gain better insight into their portfolio of projects so they could minimize resource contention. They needed a solution that could:

• Consolidate information tracked on spreadsheets
• Provide an integrated process flow for the project life-cycle
• Facilitate critical discussions for better strategic decision-making

In addition, they wanted a solution that was easy-to-use, provided a low total cost of ownership and had flexible reporting capabilities.

In August 2006, OU IT chose to implement Portfolio Intelligence® from 3 Olive Solutions. “Portfolio Intelligence best fit our strategic philosophy for project portfolio management. It gives us the right information in easy to understand formats. Also, the hosted model is appealing and the total cost of ownership is outstanding,” said Huebsch.

OU IT’s first goal was to configure their portfolios and load project data into the system. This allowed them to better understand the IT portfolio and resource utilizations. It quickly gave the CIO the comprehensive IT portfolio reports he requested. Huebsch commented, “We face significant resource contention as we try to balance operational needs and new projects. By giving our leadership better insight into priorities and projects, we can better plan and prioritize our scarce resources.”