Answer:
a.) This could be a phishing attempt. If the situation is as described in the email, this is also serious, but the method suggested is the same methods used by social hackers. Look up your IT Departments; phone number and call them about the email.
Step-by-step explanation:
This makes sense because many people do these types of scams to trick people into logging into their accounts and actually hack them from there, I actually got an email like this last week to my iCloud address. Make sure that the email actually came from the IT department by checking the domain the email comes from, and call the IT department to make sure.
Hope this helps!