Tech Pros

Session Type: Breakout Session / Leadership & Culture Track
Audience: IT leaders, managers, team leads, organizational change practitioners
Abstract
As IT organizations scale, merge, and restructure, the human element often becomes the first casualty. Processes are optimized, org charts are redrawn, and teams are asked to collaborate across new boundaries—yet the relationships that make collaboration possible rarely receive the same level of attention.

This session explores how to intentionally align initiatives/projects/services to institutional strategic plans, creatively communicate measurable impact in ways that resonate with leadership, and leverage advisory committees as collaborative partners for proactive feedback on a variety of efforts.

The era of the "annual certificate" is over. Following the adoption of Ballot SC-081v3, we have entered a phased reduction of SSL/TLS validity periods: dropping to 200 days in March 2026, 100 days in 2027, and finally 47 days by 2029. Crucially, the Domain Control Validation (DCV) reuse period is shrinking even further—slashing down to just 10 days by the end of this transition. For Penn State's distributed IT environment, this means proving domain ownership is no longer a "once a year" task, but a continuous requirement.

Attendees will learn about and be able to discuss Talent Shares and how they offer opportunities to enhance their skills, grow their career, network within the University and open up job possibilities.

This session presents the Penn State IT – Online Education and Outreach model for intentional client engagement. We will demonstrate how our team establishes shared understanding between business units and IT, applies impact and satisfaction measures to guide conversations, surfaces transparency with project status and progress, and utilizes simplified business‑unit‑provided ratings and context to point out actionable insights for leadership awareness and focus.

Organizations are using low-code tools like Power Automate and Power Apps to accelerate digital transformation, empower non-IT "citizen developers," and improve daily workflows. As adoption increases, so do new challenges: security concerns, duplicated efforts, inconsistent solution design, and uncertainty among users regarding where to find guidance and support.

This session will be a presentation and demo of future media production capabilities being added to select Studio One's installations across the commonwealth and the educational possibilities it can unlock for classes in higher education.

We’ll walk through upcoming changes to endpoint management tools, timelines, and what units should expect in the coming year(s).

In today’s rapidly evolving technology landscape, IT professionals thrive not only through technical expertise but through strong, supportive communities. This session explores how intentional networking, peer collaboration, and professional development pathways can accelerate career growth and elevate entire organizations.

The administration of Penn State’s Enterprise Network is becoming increasingly effective using a growing ecosystem of platforms including NetBox, ServiceNow, Juniper Support Insights (JSI) collected via an on premises Lightweight Collector (LWC), and the expanding adoption of Mist for edge switching and wireless access points. Each platform provides valuable insight on its own; however, out of the box, these systems operate largely in isolation.