A New Approach to Technology Software in Higher Ed

Sponsored by:

• New technology should prioritize the user experience by offering integrated and intuitive interfaces that align with the expectations of today’s users.
• One of the main challenges business schools encounter when integrating new technologies into their operations is navigating the diverse needs of stakeholders. APL nextEd helps bring academic teams and processes together using one platform.
• Successful software implementation requires a well-defined change management plan and ongoing commitment from software providers to enhance and adapt their platforms to meet the changing needs in higher education.

Transcript

Kathleen Gibson: [0:13] Some of the reasons that it's important for colleges of business to think about adopting new technology is certainly reflected in the tremendous change and evolution of higher education that's happening today.

[0:29] The user experience is vastly different when we look at software that was developed today versus 10, 15, 20 years ago, and even in the last few years. Adopting technology that is using the tools that are most important to users and are creating that terrific, integrated, and intuitive user interface is really important.

[0:57] We live in a world now where we want seamless integration in our user experience. In an academic operations platform, we want to be able to see faculty data that may come out of the HRIS or the SIS. We want to see course information that might come out of the SIS. We want to see outcomes that may come out of the LMS.

 Adopting technology that is using the tools that are most important to users and are creating that terrific, integrated, and intuitive user interface is really important.

[1:18] Understanding how data is imported into the system, how data is generated in the system, and how most importantly, data is exported out of the system is a huge consideration in software buying now, and one that sometimes operators and business school leaders, and other academic leaders don't take into account.

[1:41] They're looking at that front end user experience, which is very important. They are desiring data integration, but perhaps not really considering making sure that the systems that they're looking at have the kinds of API connectors, have the kinds of import and export functionality that are going to help create that higher education management ecosystem.

[2:08] Products like APL nextED, for example, though, will provide a more comprehensive solution, which will provide users not only a more intuitive and next gen user experience, but really provide that integrated, seamless experience, where users aren't having to log on to 5, 6, or 10 different systems.

Having a change management plan is absolutely vital to a successful launch of any new software and really centralizing operations in a way that makes sense with today's higher education environment.

[2:32] When we think about particularly enterprise software like APL nextED, where you're bringing lots of stakeholders together to share data, to participate and work together in various workflows, you have the challenge of bringing together many divisions who may have done things process-wise very differently.

[2:57] In addition to having a clear set of functional priorities, it's also very important to establish pre-implementation how a system's going to be considered, what sorts of configurations are going to be used to set particular processes.

[3:16] Having a change management plan is absolutely vital to a successful launch of any new software and really centralizing operations in a way that makes sense with today's higher education environment.

[3:33] When you're looking at software in this day and age, looking for companies that are continuing to improve their platforms, that are continuing to build functionality, that are continuing to upgrade functionality, and that are really listening and attuned with the marketplace and the things that are happening, particularly in higher education, and developing product to meet those needs is really important.