JISC Answers

I don’t think it is possible to give a definitive answer to this question at the moment.  Considerable effort is being made to retain the individual service identities that our customers value and to ensure that customers retain their direct connections with the services they use the most.  I don’t think (and this is just a personal view) that we have fully explored how we deal with new resources that are created entirely collaboratively.  We also need to think very hard about how we address new audiences (such as the BCE) audience who may not have existing relationships with any of the services.  We must ensure they can find the resources and services they need without necessarily having to know how JISC Services is structured.  This is an area where there are bound to be strong views and I feel there is a lot of thinking to be done to ensure we take the best approach for our customers.  I am sure others may wish to respond to this question too.

It seems to me to be inevitable that sooner or later the branding of the company will take precedence over the current branding of individual services. How quickly this happens is once again for the new MD. I would see an interim phase where the JISC Services 'umbrella' groups activities together more consistently followed perhaps by a stage that runs more clearly as JISC Services but with groupings of activities that relate more diectly to audience issues - say Legal, Training or whatever. This will be contentious but in my view inevitable and presumably will need the outcomes of the current sifting work. Despite opinions about the value of current brands, to continue with the current multi-brand approach would make it more difficult to integrate potential new areas into the structure adn does little to help access and involve new audience groups - still that's my view!