A Few Suggestions:

There is a major difference between the corporate world and the local Independent School District. The school district is run by administrators who are hired by the taxpayers with high quality education as a goal - not profit. These taxpayers may be highly educated, may not be, may be financially literate, may not be, may be technologically literate, and may not be. Therefore, they do require a different approach than corporate stockholders and most administrators have adjusted their methods to match the situation at their school.

 

I have presented technology information, budget and otherwise, to school boards at four different schools. I found them all to be very intelligent and more than capable of understanding all the concepts involved in a discussion of Return On Investment or Total Cost of Ownership. I also found that they appreciated it when I used laymen's terms to describe things. Many other school administrators feel the same way and try not to get caught up in specific jargon related to any field, with the possible exception of education.

 

A lot of administrators moved up from teacher to principal to director to executive director to asst. superintendent to superintendent. During this process they learned a lot of education jargon and not a lot of the corporate world or finance world jargon. However, having worked in both worlds also, I can assure you that many of the financial administrators at school districts have as good or better a handle on finance as their corporate brothers and sisters. I know quite a number of corporate world companies that went belly up. I believe only one in five survives the first five years. Just look at MCI and Enron for examples of how reliable finances are at Fortune 500 type companies.

 

My opinion is that most administrators prefer background information that they can use with their school boards. Document the average life on computers, printers, and other equipment. They understand that everything electronic gets old and slow and dies. They understand annual maintenance contracts, warranties, training issues and productivity. A simple survey of the staff on the productivity of their job as it relates to their equipment will help tremendously.

 

BUT! In a school district's budget you only have a pie! If they give you more money, they have to take it from someone else. Who will that be and why is your request more important than theirs? When people go before the school board or the administration they act as if there is an endless pot of money and new money can be found for their project. That is just not true! The money you get comes from some other program and that is where you must make your point. The only other way is to borrow the money and that is usually viewed as a last resort to pay salaries.

 

People should understand that, even if a district has a large fund balance, any extra money in the bank is for emergencies only. Such as when a storm collapses the roof of a building. That means it is usually untouchable.

 

An additional key concept is grants. In the past the majority of technology expansions were financed by grants and the sustainability of the equipment was not budgeted - ever. The school purchased technology with "matching funds" and budget surpluses. This is why I wrote the comments I did on E-Rate seductions. Purchasing technology with 80% & 90% discounted money, with the belief that it will always be there, is ignoring the sustainability issues. It will only make the budget situation worse when the E-Rate program is reduced or done away with. All you have to do is watch the Federal budget arguments to see how easy they cut technology funding.

 

Now there is a corporate world solution to this. If the school does not have the funding ability to sustain the level of technology they have, then it must cut back. Look at General Motors right now. I worked in and for the corporate world for many years in technology and watched this happen time and again. We need to convince the State to send more money for technology or we must fit our technology into our schools' budget. When budgets are tightening and cuts must be made there is very little sympathy for a ROI or TCO plan, no matter what terms are used to describe it.

 

So is there a solid data analysis tool that works for all schools? No. Do some schools use Gartner? Yes. Are there adminstrators and school board members that understand all of that financial jargon? Of course.

 

My recommendation would be to set up an appointment with your superintendent, or finance administrator, and find out what your piece of the pie is before you start working on a budget to advertise or sell to others. Then build your budget and go back to him about needing a bigger piece and bring your justification with. If you can not convince him, then perhaps it is time to replace what you can with Open Source, consolidate and/or reduce services, and cut back.

 

Products such as Zenworks can really help. Going from one $12,000 server to two $4,000 servers can also save money. None of us likes to cut back, but if your school is in a bad financial situation, or is trying to avoid one, you may have to.

 

Good Luck!

 

Dirk D Dykstra