Year One Insights: Digital Workplace

Over the last year, teams across Humber have been working to transform the future of work to increase collaboration, effectiveness and to keep us connected with campus community and culture.  

As we noted in the Digital Campus of Tomorrow, Humber’s Digital Campus Plan, we are being intentional in our actions to evolve the digital workplace and continue to adapt to the changing environment and needs of staff.  

Initiatives related to the Digital Workplace can help enhance and better reflect the current workflows for staff across the organization. Some of these initiatives include: 

The Launch of Copilot, Humber’s AI Chat Solution 

  • Copilot is just like ChatGPT, but it has commercial data protection from Microsoft and offers up-to-date information. This means that you can input proprietary information into the tool without worry that it will become public information. It can also assist with generating new ideas, improving writing, and summarizing long text.  

  • As you continue to explore this new AI tool, ITS reminds you to use Copilot ethically and responsibly, based on Humber’s General Statement on Using Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) Tools at Work. This tool is available to all Humber staff and information about how to access it is available in this earlier Communique post. Faculty can also reference the academic guidelines on the use of Generative Artificial Intelligence in the Classroom.  

Exploration of Co-Pilot 365 

  • Humber has been testing “Microsoft Co-Pilot for 365” as a pre-pilot within Information Technology Services which is set to be completed in the next two months. This tool provides next-level AI that is integrated within the suite of Microsoft tools within Microsoft 365.  

  • This functionality is not part of the standard Microsoft 365 offering. However, once the initial exploration is complete, Humber will expand to a pilot of the tool to faculty and staff outside of ITS. This will build on the learnings from the pre-pilot and include updated training materials and input from those involved. A student from the Research Analyst program will be assisting with determining the benefit of the tool to staff, based on their role.  

Unified Communications 2.0 

  • Humber is working toward advancing communication and collaboration across the institution. There are three elements to this work: 

  • A transition to a Contact Centre as a Service will help to improve the experience of those contacting Humber with an inquiry. They will be able to do so through phones, email, social media, chat and an AI Chat bot. This will provide flexibility to inquirers and allow our Contact Centre team to continue to provide important information to our community in a fast and efficient manner. 

  • Replacing desk phones and telephone extensions with Teams Phone functionality. Teams Phone adds a dial pad to Teams to allow incoming and outgoing telephone calls from anywhere in the world. Teams Phone goes live this summer with desk phones starting to be removed this fall.  

  • Classroom, hallway and reception area phones will be replaced with Teams-compatible phones in 2025.  

Thank you to the teams involved in these initiatives for helping to push the plan forward. In the coming days, I will also share updates related to Digital Fluency and Student Experience.  
 
Scott Briggs 
Vice-President, Digital Innovation and CIO