Strategic Priorities
UCLA Digital & Technology Solutions
FROM THE CIO
Dear Bruin Community:
Great universities rely on a trusted technological landscape to operate. At the nation’s #1 public university, UCLA Digital & Technology Solutions (DTS) strives to provide exceptional technology experiences that empower Bruins to advance education, research, and community service. Guided by the principles to innovate, accelerate, and inspire, DTS is driving technological excellence and shaping a more connected, modern, and innovative campus.
Over the past year, our organization has undergone a comprehensive transformation to redesign our structure and operating model, realign our strategic priorities, and enhance our ability to deliver outstanding technology solutions. We emerge from our transformation as a forward-thinking IT organization ready to serve the academic and administrative needs of our campus community.
We are proud to introduce our first annual Strategic Priorities report, outlining the key areas where we will focus our efforts. These priorities reflect our commitment to delivering technology that empowers teaching, research, and operations at UCLA:
1. Elevate the Academic Digital Experience
2. Optimize Business & Administrative Technologies
3. Modernize Security & Advance Digital Resilience
4. Drive IT Service & Operational Excellence
5. Reimagine IT: Workforce & Culture
These priorities are more than goals – they are a commitment to action. Over the next year, we will work with our campus community to provide technology that is not just functional, but transformational.
We invite you to explore the full Strategic Priorities report to see how DTS is shaping the future of technology at UCLA and building a smarter, more connected, and more resilient campus. Together, let’s innovate, accelerate, and inspire.
Sincerely,
Lucy Avetisyan Chief Information Officer UCLA Digital & Technology Solutions
1. Elevate the Academic Digital Experience
Advance technology-enabled learning and research to enhance UCLA’s academic mission.
Objectives:
• Enhance learning with personalized and flexible solutions that adapt to student and instructor needs, simplify admin tasks, and deepen engagement.
• Enrich research by designing and building reliable, highperforming computing and networking to increase access to scalable and secure infrastructure and data.
• Amplify diverse perspectives into innovative solutions, advancing accessibility, equity, and inclusion through human-centered approaches.
• Develop AI Literacy and Training Programs to establish comprehensive AI education and training initiatives for students, faculty, and staff to enhance digital fluency, responsible AI use, and innovation in academic and operational settings.
2. Optimize Business & Administrative Technologies
Drive digital transformation to improve university efficiency, effectiveness, and decision-making.
Objectives:
• Expand seamless and secure access to university data by advancing analytics and effective governance while promoting data hygiene for optimized retention and security.
• Advance the campus digital journey through simplified experiences that streamline interactions for students, faculty, and staff by automating and integrating across boundaries.
• Empower users with self-service experiences using next-gen technologies. Deliver intuitive solutions that make getting information and help easier while streamlining admin tasks.
• Elevate the workplace and academic experience with tools that accelerate collaboration and productivity while seamlessly integrating identity to provide tailored experiences.
3. Modernize Security & Advance Digital Resilience
Strengthen UCLA’s cybersecurity, IT operations, compliance, and IT resilience for a future-proof campus.
Objectives:
• Advance cybersecurity maturity with modern architecture and infrastructure, AI-driven threat intelligence, persona-based user awareness training, and proactive risk management mitigation strategies.
• Leverage automation and AI for better performing and more secure digital environments to optimize service delivery and quickly adapt to institutional needs and risks.
• Strengthen identity and access management (IAM) to support a seamless and secure user lifecycle experience for students, faculty, staff, and affiliates.
• Strengthen security and ensure business continuity with resilient hybrid-IT solutions and flexible recovery and response.
4. Drive IT Service & Operational Excellence
Transform IT services and programs through proactive, user-centered, and data-driven delivery.
Objectives:
• Create a unified digital technology model that fosters operational transparency, builds strategic partnership, and streamlines administrative response.
• Adopt iterative development and transparent management to continuously improve and accelerate products and services through adaptable planning, standardized delivery and integrated toolsets.
• Develop internal and external partnerships to cultivate collaborations with industry leaders, technology firms, and research institutions to drive innovation, enhance educational and operational capabilities, and create opportunities for knowledge exchange and applied learning.
• Implement Strategic IT Portfolio Management through the development and oversight of a comprehensive IT portfolio management framework to prioritize, evaluate, and govern IT investments, ensuring alignment with institutional goals, optimized resource allocation, and measurable business impact.
• Strengthen IT Program & Organizational Change Management by adopting a structured approach to IT initiatives that aligns with institutional priorities and stakeholder needs, builds strategic partnerships and robust relationships, and implements change adoption strategies to drive engagement and deliver effective transformations.
• Enhance IT Governance & Decision-Making Framework to enable a comprehensive IT governance model that ensures strategic alignment, accountability, and transparent decision-making processes across UCLA’s IT ecosystem.
• Optimize Financial, Procurement, and HR Management for DTS by ensuring strategic and operational alignment of finance, procurement, and HR processes to maximize the efficiency, transparency, and impact of ITS capital investments, operational expenditures, and resource allocation.
• Establish product management for sustainable, secure innovations that meet the needs of the campus community at the speed of progress.
• Advance excellence through reliable solutions and consistent results with services the campus can trust through effective intake and management, ensuring every request is handled efficiently, transparently, and with the best possible outcome.
• Optimize outcomes with smarter, more efficient operations that reduce tech debt and waste by consolidating and optimizing systems for a futureready foundation.
5. Develop Talent and Strengthen Culture
Foster a diverse, skilled, and forward-thinking IT workforce that drives digital transformation.
Objectives:
• Align ITS Performance Goals with Strategic Objectives to ensure that teams and individuals establish performance goals that directly support ITS strategic priorities, reinforcing UCLA’s mission of teaching, learning, research, and service.
• Foster a “Day One” Mindset of Continuous Innovation that fosters agile problem solving and a fail-fast ready environment through pilots and experimentation.
• Strengthen UCLA’s ITS Employee Value Proposition by defining and promoting a compelling ITS employee value proposition that highlights career growth opportunities, workplace culture, competitive benefits, and UCLA’s mission-driven impact to attract, retain, and motivate top IT talent.
• Implement initiatives that foster employee engagement, recognition, and well-being, including mentorship programs, leadership development, and regular feedback mechanisms to cultivate a motivated and high-performing IT workforce.
• Invest in upskilling to meet strategic direction, ensuring UCLA’s IT talent remains at the forefront of technological innovation.
• Enhance DEI programs, creating a culture of belonging and opportunity.
• Support hybrid and flexible work models, optimizing productivity and work-life balance for IT professionals.
• Develop IT talent pipelines through partnerships with UCLA academic programs, providing students with hands-on experience in enterprise technology.
• Create an optimization culture to do more while spending less, streamlining systems, optimizing resources, and reducing costs to deliver more value with every dollar spent.
• Build a customer-first mindset that focuses on empathy, kindness, clear communication, proactive problem solving, and responsiveness across all customer segments.
