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Past CNI Projects
 Institution-Wide Information Strategies
Institution-Wide Information Strategies:
Introduction to the Project
The Coalition for Networked Information's (CNI) Institution-Wide Information
Strategies project was conceived as an initiative at the intersection of two
powerful forces at work in the education and research enterprise: the rapidly
changing network platform, which includes telecommunication networks,
network-centric computing, and networked information resources; and the
emerging network organization, which is providing a flexible and responsive
alternative to hierarchies and bureaucracies.
The project sought to assist the higher education community to understand,
describe and promote institution-wide strategies for networked information
resource and service development across five major dimensions: a) technology
platforms, b) financial resources, c) organizational and human resources,
d) policies and practices, and e) strategic alignment.
The initiative was designed to address the questions: how does an
institution coordinate its activities and allocate its resources to
best manage and support its use of information and information
technology? What are the critical issues, and what are the "best practices"
with respect to information and information technology?
The project sought to bring together a diverse mix of institutions, each of
which was thinking strategically about the management and use of information
on an institution-wide scale and was already working on some specific aspect
of these issues. The initiative brought these institutions into communication
with one another so they could share their experiences while their work was
still in progress and, in so doing, learn from one another, gain new
perspectives on difficult aspects of their own work, and improve or expand
upon efforts at their own institutions.
The participating institutions were:
- California State University System
- Indiana University
- Joint Information Systems Committee
- Lehigh University
- Mount Holyoke College
- Mary Washington College
- University of California - Davis
- University of Memphis
- University of Michigan
- Villanova University
This initiative has also created a vehicle for broadly sharing the
experiences and insights of the participants through the analytic
case studies of information strategies at
participating institutions, available on CNI's
website. These case studies represent a compendium of current
best practices in strategies that address a range of institution-wide
information management challenges.
Gerry Bernbom,
Special Assistant for Digital Libraries and Distance Education,
Indiana University, and a CNI Visiting Program Officer, was the project coordinator.
IWIS Project Participants
IWIS Case Studies
IWIS Project Conference:
July 21-22, 1997, Washington, DC
IWIS Publications
- White Paper: Institution-Wide Information Strategies (IWIS)
A CNI Initiative (draft version 1.1)
March 9, 1997
This article continues a program of work begun by the late Paul Evan
Peters, founding Executive Director of the Coalition for Networked
Information. The text draws on Paul's thoughts, ideas, and early
writings in the area of enterprise wide information strategies,
and on the input of an informal group of advisors that Paul had
assembled from the archives, library, technology, and information
resources professions.
- Gerald Bernbom, "Institution-Wide Information Strategies," CAUSE/EFFECT volume 20, number 1 (Spring 1997), pp. 8-11.
- Gerald Bernbom, The Information Professions and Enterprise-Wide Information Strategies, CAUSE/EFFECT volume 19, number 3 (Fall 1996), pp. 4-5).
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