Seven Information Technology (IT) employees have been laid off as part of a department restructuring.

Marywood President Sr. Mary Persico, IHM, Ed.D announced the restructuring, which also includes new positions and changes to IT services, in a president’s memo on June 11.

In an interview with The Wood Word, Persico said IT Director Thomas Steffes determined the IT department could benefit from restructuring when he came to the university last December.

“He felt we could restructure the IT department in such a way that we could streamline our use of IT, we could connect things like Help Desk and network usage, and that also, if we took advantage of grant funding, we would be able to get some structural improvements that would help us in the long run,” Persico said.

After reviewing these areas and interviewing employees, Steffes did an assessment of how duties and operations within the department could be streamlined. He then presented his analysis to Vice President for Business Affairs Tammy McHale.

“They discussed how they would do this reorganization. It turns out we were able to do it by using only 14 people as opposed to 21, and that would of course necessitate some layoffs,” Persico said.

Operationally, the IT department now has three areas: infrastructure services, educational technology services and enterprise services. Help Desk and Field Support were combined to form Desktop Services and a Help Desk online ticketing system will become available over the summer.

The restructuring created the new positions of associate director of educational technology services, business process analyst, database/colleague administrator and operations assistant.

“We’re hoping that some of those people who were let go will apply for some of the positions that were created by this restructuring, and that might minimize the number of people who were let go,” Persico said.

Steffes also helped the university receive a grant that will improve network usage on campus, she said.

Persico said that these changes weren’t made for the sake of cutting costs because the university will use the money saved in other ways.

“I think many people thought of it as a cost-saving move, but it really was about becoming more efficient and more effective in terms of IT usage than anything else,” Persico said.

Persico said the administration knew the IT department needed changes since last year when the former head of IT left Marywood. This is the first time the department has been restructured in “many years,” she said.

“In the absence of someone who does this for a living, and who has experience in a university, we waited for the arrival of Mr. Steffes to help us to do this in a way that was more knowledgeable,” she said.

Persico said IT is the only department experiencing layoffs this summer.

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