Supporting a Remote Workforce
When the Bay Area announced “shelter-in-place” orders in mid-March requiring “non-essential” workers to stay home, the work lives of thousands of UCSF employees changed in an instant. IT realized it was going to take a lot of logistical planning to support the technical needs of all of these “new” remote workers, and there wasn’t a lot of time to get ready.
Ramping up redeployment
To support more remote workers, IT needed to ensure employees could get laptops and access to files through VPN (virtual private network). Capacity issues on critical technology call centers, Citrix, Duo, and other critical systems also needed to be addressed to ensure the IT infrastructure could support new needs.
They knew right away that field services, the team that offers support for computers and devices, and the service desk would be overtaxed. When an email requesting assistance went out across IT, the response was overwhelming. So many IT staff offered to help, they realized they had a new challenge: how do we assemble and organize all this volunteer help? The IT COVID-19 Response Command Center led a new internal volunteer “redeployment” effort to redirect IT staff to focus on these new areas. More than 150 staff were redeployed and trained to handle calls, triage tickets and assist with laptop deployments. IT mobilized its workforce to focus on the most pressing demand by the hour by having multiple command-center check-ins per day, heavy use of group instant messaging and assigning one staff dedicated to managing the master schedule.
Leveraging big and small tech solutions
Pierre shared that there were many slick tech ideas to help manage the logistics of scheduling, but ironically, the best solution was the simplest one: a nightly all-IT email. In other areas, high tech solutions created quick wins. UCSF Health needed an application to screen employees as they came to work, and a team created a quick solution. The urgency also allowed IT to accelerate the procurement, engineering, and rollout of Office365 (see more below). IT’s innovation in a time of need shows their incredible dedication to UCSF’s mission. Thank you, IT!