University of Utah administrator to visit KU as final CIO candidate


LAWRENCE — Kenneth Pink, deputy chief information officer and associate director of information technology at the University of Utah, will make a public presentation next week as a candidate for the chief information officer at the University of Kansas.

Pink is the final of three candidates for the position who will make public presentations during their respective campus visits. Pink’s talk will be at 10:30 a.m. Monday, April 9, in the Bruckmiller Room of the Adams Alumni Center.

The deputy CIO role for Utah's University Information Technology serves as the chief operating officer for UIT. The operation has 425 staff and a $45 million annual budget. The flagship university in Utah and a member of the PAC 12, the university has more than 32,000 students and research expenditures of $490 million annually across all campuses.

Over the course of his career, Pink has been a CIO on three occasions and a company president twice. He has led IT departments as small as seven individuals and as large as 650 people across multiple disciplines worldwide. Pink started an offshore development area for one of his previous employers as well as outsourced Y2K efforts across the world for an employer. He considers translating the needs of the institution into technology solutions and growing and empowering teams to accomplish the mission to be among his greatest strengths.

With over 30 years in the technology arena, Pink brings a wide range of experience to an institution. He started as a programmer, then moved to network and infrastructure before going into IT management. This diverse background has allowed him to be familiar with all areas of technology and to ensure they work together.

Pink has a master’s degree in business administration from Utah State University and a bachelor’s degree in finance with an emphasis in management information systems from the University of Utah.

Carl Lejuez, search committee chair and dean of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, invites KU faculty, staff and students to attend the public presentation for each CIO candidate and then provide feedback.

The CIO provides vision, leadership, oversight and management of the university’s information technology services, infrastructure, hardware and software. The CIO ensures the university leverages technology to promote excellence in innovation, research and academics. The CIO provides management oversight of KU IT resources and leads the development, implementation and ongoing updates of the campus IT strategic plan. This effort focuses on the delivery of effective, efficient and secure IT services to the entire campus community. The CIO leads more than 275 universitywide IT professionals in the areas of strategic planning, research and technology services support, enterprise resource planning, business process management, information security, web services and business continuity planning and emergency preparedness. The CIO works collaboratively with KU leadership, faculty, staff and students across the university and represents KU IT activities to various external national organizations as well as divisions of state government.

Information about each candidate and the opportunity to provide feedback are available on the CIO search website. The presentations will be recorded and available for viewing after the final candidate has presented. Feedback on the candidates will be due Thursday, April 12.

Fri, 04/06/2018

author

Jill Hummels

Media Contacts

Jill Hummels

Office of the Provost

785-864-6577