Past IT Roundtable Topics

In prep for the recent GCC IT Roundtable and IT Best Practices breakout, I went back to the topic lists from the past roundtables and slapped 'em all together.  I've just added all the discussion topics from the recent Kansas City event and figured I'd share the list with everyone.  Now, this is not organized or pruned for redundancy.  It is what it is.  If anyone wants to combine duplicates and edit it down into a more logical structure ... go for it!  Just please share your results with the rest of us.

You could use this list to ...

- help your boss AND spouse understand some of the things us IT folks are dealing with on a day-to-day basis.

- prove to your boss why you must attend a future roundtable.

- use as a discussion starter for your own local roundtable event(s).

- show to prospective volunteers as possible serve areas.

- generate/renew project ideas

- convince yourself you need a new career ;-)

- convince yourself you need a raise :-0

... ahhh, the possibilities are endless ...

Possible IT Topics for discussion

·         “CMS” vs. “ChMS”

·         802.11x Authentication

·         Accountability

·         Anti-virus; Anti-spam  Mal-ware => crime-ware

·         Asset/inventory management

·         Attendance tracking – how to collect the data

·         Automated Attendance Counting

·         Automation (making life easier)

·         Back Office Solutions: Work Orders, Workflow tools

·         Backpack, Basecamp, and other tools from 37signals - how do you use them?

·         Backups and disaster recovery

·         Backups/Disaster Recovery (and archiving, Business Continuity, possibly legal-driven data retention)

·         Best Practices for Church IT

·         Big picture - how do we keep the focus on the church and its mission, not just the tech?

·         Blogging

·         Boundaries – when and how to say “no”

·         Budgeting

·         Building automation

·         Building Security (access)

·         Cell phone payments, central management

·         Centralized Data (single source of truth)

·         ChMS selection & migration; "why are you happy or unhappy with your current solution?"

·         ChMS selection and implementation

·         CHURCH focus of Church IT (as opposed to technology focus)

·         Church Leadership & IT connection

·         Congregant involvement metrics

·         Content filtering, incl remote users

·         Content Management Systems

·         Contribution processing and Check 21 (remote bank deposit)

·         Copyright issues (incl risk management)

·         Customer Service

·         Data Retention policies (including Legal issues)

·         Desktop Management

·         Determining Infrastructure needs (# Servers)

·         Digital signage

·         Disaster Recovery

·         Disk quotas; personal data storage

·         Document Management Solutions (incl multi-site issues)

·         Documentation (Wikis?), Search (incl. Desktop Search)*

·         Donated equipment

·         Email broadcast systems

·         Firewalls

·         Google apps

·         Guess access, volunteer access

·         Hardware check-out & check-in

·         Helpdesk software

·         How do you keep your IT team spiritually healthy?

·         How do you lead up?

·         How do you organize your life?

·         How is running a church IT department different from running a secular IT department?

·         How much time to you spend with people instead of computers?

·         Infrastructure, VLANS, routing,

·         Instant Messaging (internal?)

·         Integrated web sites: ChMS, other web apps, content, single sign-on, usability

·         Integrating ChMS and Public websites

·         Internal Staff communication / Intranet

·         Internet campus – is it really church?

·         Intranets, document management, and SharePoint

·         Inventory/Audit Software & Hardware

·         Is serving on a church staff bad for your spiritual life?

·         IT and spiritual warfare – are we on the front lines and not aware of it?

·         IT as a ministry, beyond the church staff

·         IT Budgets

·         IT Health: how do you report your status?

·         IT's relationship to leadership, staff, and congregation

·         iTunes and problem programs, media, consumption of space

·         Keeping up with 'stuff.'  Inventory and lots more.  Anyone have a complete solution?

·         Knowledge bases

·         License management

·         Loaner equipment: Check-in, Check-out

·         Local admin rights

·         Mac support; AD integration

·         Management dashboard reporting – what does upper management want to see?

·         Managing church growth

·         Mass outbound e-mail (e-mail marketing)

·         Mobile data security

·         Mobile devices

·         Monitoring, Systems Management

·         MS Communication Server

·         Multi-site/multi-campus

·         Network monitoring

·         New construction

·         New employee/applicant testing

·         Non-Desktop connectivity: media equipment, copiers,

·         Notebook usage for schools (purchase vs. byo, etc.)

·         Office 2007

·         OneNote: Best Practices

·         Open source vs. Freeware

·         Organizing IT work: how do you prioritize, how do you track, how do you research?

·         Outsourcing?

·         Patch management

·         Phone issues: unified messaging, VOIP, CTI, etc.

·         Pod casting, blogging, Web 2.0, "how do you [pretend to] stay current?"

·         Policies & Procedures (IT Standards), Incl Volunteers

·         Printer management

·         Priorities

·         Project management

·         Provisioning new users: imaging, configuring, deploying

·         R&D: what do you do?

·         Remote access for staff and volunteers

·         Reporting status to upper management and committees

·         Requests (support)

·         Rights, Permissions to install, end-user policies

·         Risk Management; volunteer access & control

·         SaaS vs internally hosted applications

·         SANs

·         Sarbanes/Oxley compliance/issues

·         Security: anti-virus, anti-spam, anti-spyware, content filtration, firewalls, security appliances, auditing

·         Social networking and ChMS

·         SSL/VPN

·         Staff compensation and outsourcing costs

·         Staffing: finding people, annual reviews, compensation, when to outsource, spiritual health

·         Standardization and disk imaging

·         Storage - setting quotas on file and e-mail space, dealing with lots of pictures, MP3s, and videos

·         Storage: max, quotas, expansion, retirement

·         Strategic planning

·         Strategy vs. Technology (planning vs. doing)

·         Streaming

·         Strengths and weaknesses of your current ChMS

·         Supporting high-maintenance/non-technical users

·         T1 vs. DSL vs. other Internet uplinks

·         Tagging (technoratti, del.icio.us, etc.)

·         Tech support best practices: ticket systems, triage, escalation, response time and resolution time

·         Telephone: Unified Messaging, VOIP, CTI, and other Telephone-related technologies

·         Tracking inter-household family relationships (my mom is a separate household from me)

·         Training: Users, IT Staff

·         TV/video signage/DVD

·         Users and local administrators?

·         Using the Internet for evangelism

·         Vendor management, procurement, bids, pricing

·         Virtualization

·         Vista

·         VLANS

·         Volunteer management: recruiting, processes, security concerns, spiritual nurture, impact on schedules

·         Vulnerability Testing

·         Web sites and content management

·         Who can send an all-staff e-mail?

·         Who gets what (hardware), when, trickle down, rotation

·         WiFi Best practices

·         Work-flow/routing/process automation

Comments

[Tony Dye]

Thanks for assembling this great reminder. What's amazing is how much of that stuff really was discussed at one time or another!

[Trace Pupke]

Looks like my To-Do list. :)

[Mike Henry]

Wow, no wonder I feel so overwhelmed at times. That is a long list of stuff to have bouncing around in one's brain! (Even when Google is an extension of your brain.)