Executive Officer – Digitalization projects and a manager’s perspective

Hello everyone,

This post is for introducing myself and what I am going to write about and why it might be interesting for you as a reader to follow. The reason this might be interesting for you is because I’m an executive officer for a public university in Norway called Universitetet I Agder (UiA). I’m one of those in charge of digitalizing the university, which is very complex and interesting.

The topic I am going to write about is the projects I’m in charge of with an IT perspective and from the position of an executive officer. I would like to have more of a discussion-based approach to the chosen topics (both technical and non-technical), this is because the projects are often very large and complex and can be solved in a hundred different ways. The way I chose to solve them is not always the best, and this is where you as a reader can contribute greatly. In these cases, I would like to create discussions on these topics and reflections on the approaches chosen. This will obviously require some readers, but I hope that we can get that with time.

Before we get that far I would like to introduce myself properly and the place I work. My name is Kevin B. Z. Adriaansen and I have been working as an executive officer for almost 2 years. I have a bachelor in IT and Information systems, and a master’s in information systems.

The University in Agder is one of the leading universities in Norway. It has about 12 000 students and 1300 employees, based over campus Kristiansand and Grimstad, both I south Norway. As I mentioned UiA is a public university and this will have to be considered when discussing for the different topics and will probably be the topic of discussion as well. My next post will be more concrete on the projects I’m running, so we can have discussion(s) around the real cases.

On to the discussion for this post: I’m only 23 years old, giving me both an edge and a disadvantage compared to the other project managers and leaders which is much older than me. An edge in the sense that I’m “fresh and updated/modern” and have a different approach compared to the others (for example plan-based vs agile methodology). At the same time, I have a disadvantage in the sense that the others have much more experience than me. What do you think about the “gamble” the leadership at the university took in employing a very young person to a higher manager position? Would you have employed an unexperienced young person into a leader position? Can the disadvantage in experience be compensated in some way?