Boise State University brochure – March 2019

HOW THE WILD WEST OF IT G OVE R NAN C E WA S W O N

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CA M PU S -W I D E TEC H N O LO GY TR A N S FO R M ATI O N WRITTEN BY

HARRY MENEAR PRODUCED BY

CRAIG DANIELS

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w w w.bo i se st a te. ed u

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BRIAN BOLT, DEPUT Y CIO OF BOISE STATE U N I V E R S I T Y, D I S C U S S E S T H E U N I Q U E CHALLENGES OF EFFECTING T E C H N O LO G I CA L T R A N S FO R M AT I O N I N A N E N T E R P R I S E - S CA L E E D U CAT I O N A L I N ST I T U T I O N

F

or the most part, the days

in 1997, and then as a full-time employ-

when an employee would

ee in 1999. After leaving for a couple

graduate school or college,

years, Bolt returned and has been with

secure a job, work for 30 years and

the University’s IT organization ever

collect a commemorative watch have

since. He earned his MBA from Boise

gone the way of the stegosaurus, the

State in 2006 and became Deputy

French Monarchy and Betamax. The

Chief Information Officer in 2015. His

US Bureau of Labor found that, in 2018,

long career in higher-ed IT allows for

the median number of years wage and

an increasingly unique perspective as

salary workers spent in a single job

an innovator and solutioner.

was just 4.2. Brian Bolt began working at Boise State as a student employee

“I came to Boise to pursue a Bachelor’s Degree. I built on my fondness for

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computers and joined a pilot program learning something that doesn’t exist anymore called Novell NetWare,” he reminisces. “It was basically a file and print service. And that’s where I got my start that led to a student employment job on campus.” Bolt’s career with Boise State has long outlived Novell NetWare, which released its final update in 2009. Over the course of his 20-year IT career he has been at the heart of major changes to the campus’ w w w.bo i se st a te. ed u

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IT governance. We sat down with Bolt to find out about the challenges of effecting technological transformation and change management across an enterprise-scale higher learning institution, and about Boise State’s current plans to implement a campus-wide Customer Relationship Management (CRM) approach to use data analysis to improve and maintain Boise’s university-student relationships.

Located in the West of Idaho, Boise State University was founded in 1932 by the Episcopal Church, becoming an w w w.bo i se st a te. ed u

independent junior college two years later. In 2019, wwwwit has over 24,000 attendees and was reclassified in 2015 as a Carnegie doctoral research university, as well as placing 45th on the US News and World Report’s 2019 list of Most Innovative Universities. This year is also on track to have the institution’s largest first-year class in the university’s history.

To manage the ever-growing student body, Bolt and the rest of the Boise State’s IT department are working 08

to begin the implementation of their campus-wide CRM over the next year, with incremental rollouts expected to begin in late 2019. “We don’t yet have a CRM for students that are in the K-12 environment. They’re our future

important part.” Managing IT govern-

pipeline if you’re looking at it from

ance strategy at an enterprise-scale

a strictly sales point of view. And at the

educational institution presents its own

other end of the spectrum, we have

unique difficulties, particularly when

programs at the university that cater to

implementing campus-wide technol-

the retirement community and ongoing

ogy transformation. Bolt reflects on

education. The lifespan of a customer

the challenges to be faced in order to

for us could be 60 years long,” explains

successfully roll out the CRM: “There’s

Bolt. “But right now, we only have a

managing technology change in a very

CRM for the bookends of our lifecycle:

disparate environment, learning how

applicants and alumni. We have noth-

to manage change rollouts, and also

ing in between that manages the most

being accepting of the fact that some

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E XE CU T I VE PRO FI LE

Brian Bolt Brian began his academic studies at Boise State in 1996 and started his IT career the following year.

After learning about the higher-ed environment as a departmental Network Administrator, he moved to the central IT office as a Systems Engineer. From there, he progressed into management roles within technical operations until founding the Project Management Office in 2011. He currently serves as Deputy CIO.

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“ T H E L I F E S PA N O F A C U STO M E R FO R U S COULD BE 60 YEARS LO N G , B U T R I G H T N OW W E O N LY H AV E A CRM FOR THE B O O K E N D S O F T H AT L I F E CYC L E : A P P L I C ANTS AND ALUMNI” — Brian Bolt, Deputy Chief Information Office, Boise State University 10

of the technologies we have may have reached the end of their lifecycle.”

Over the course of his career at Boise, Bolt has faced each of these challenges and more.

Though his career at Boise State began working with the Novell NetWare operating system, by 2007 Bolt could see that transformation and transition were long overdue. “At one point in time, universities were looked to as leaders with regard to technology and its adoption,” he says, “but I think in the 90s the corporate world started to get ahead.” Technology, Bolt points out, became more entrenched and slower moving in academia. “So, we held onto our Novell infrastructure for a lot longer than the corporate world ever did. Which is fine. It’s just kind of the way that universities work, and there’s a reason why universities have been around for a long time. They’re typically deliberate about their decision-making process.” Boise’s relationship with Novell came to an end as a result of reduced reliability due to vendors not being able to invest as much money in maintenance updates. “We were probably one of the last schools running

CLICK TO WATCH : ‘MILLION DOLLAR SCHOLARS’ 11 Novell’s technology,” he says. “It was

the idea to management and IT “and

a dying technology that wasn’t being

that was the first domino of remov-

maintained as well as it could be.”

ing Novell from our environment.” He

Bolt reflects that the transition that

laughs before admitting that “it was

followed Boise leaving Novell behind

kind of the Wild West of IT govern-

was one of the “big breaks” of his

ance back then. We kind of inflicted

career. “I received an invitation to the

change on campus, and the first year

Googleplex to learn about Google

afterwards was pretty rocky. We had

Apps for Education. This was 2007,

some people that were very satisfied

remember,” he notes, “the early days.”

and some people that were really not.

Bolt attended the Googleplex in 2007

We had rocked their world by taking

to learn about the work being done

away their email client and calendaring

to bring Google apps to educational

system they’d been using for ten years.”

institutions. Excited by the possibili-

The fallout from the implementation of

ties, Bolt returned to Boise and pitched

Google Apps taught Bolt valuable lesw w w.bo i se st a te. ed u

24,000+

Approximate number of students

200+

Programs of study

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1,135

Full time staff

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sons about the benefits of staggered rollouts and pilot programs. “I learned a lot about what happens after a project goes live in a large, disparate organization such as a higher-ed institution,” he says. “If you’re afforded the opportunity to start small and rollout incrementally, that’s a good path to take.”

Bolt has worked with Boise State’s current Chief Information Officer, Max Davis-Johnson, since he joined the university from Arizona State in 2010.

“Max was a game changer in terms 14

of how the university viewed technology as more of a strategic partner rather than just a cost center,” says Bolt. Davis-Johnson was responsible for implementing the university’s Roadmap series of transformational projects across campus. Excitedly, Bolt says, “As a result of that, we got a data warehouse off the ground, and we implemented our first student and faculty portal.” Then, he explains, the IT department used these large projects as a base on which to build up its governance structure.

With either large-scale projects or gradual transformation of IT governance strategies, Bolt reasserts the

fact that technological transformation across universities is about managing the expectations and response of diverse user groups. “Thankfully we’re in 2019 now, and not in 2008,” he says, reflecting on the overall level of technological literacy. “Our faculty and staff have become more adept at using technology. I think ten years has made a lot of difference.” On the other hand, the expectations of students have changed, influenced by a generation of social media users and online consumers. “Some of our applications and systems had more of a legacy look and feel,” didn’t provoke positive responses from the student body. “They want to see the stuff that provides convenience more than anything else,” explains Bolt. “And that takes us into the current generation of thinking, which uses data to provide that,” which is at the heart of Boise’s new CRM. “Right now, we have a task force in place. We have a charge that’s been given to us by three of the University’s six Vice Presidents,” says Bolt. The task force is exploring a unique approach to the process, which took shape during the department’s exploration of the w w w.bo i se st a te. ed u

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solutions offered by Amazon Web Services. “We decided to go down the AWS route,” says Bolt, reflecting that it took a year-and-a-half to unite the IT, purchasing and legal departments in support of “buying a commodity as a service, not a capital investment.” He laughs, “no kidding. So after eighteen months, we had a signed contract with AWS, which provided us a suite of tools to use for new projects.” Once the department had access to AWS, their governance strategy took a note from 16

“ T H E R E ’S A R E A S O N WHY UNIVERSITIES H AV E B E E N A R O U N D FO R A LO N G T I M E .

T H E Y ’ R E T Y P I CA L LY D E L I B E R AT E A B O U T THEIR DECISIONM A K I N G P R O C E S S” — Brian Bolt, Deputy Chief Information Office, Boise State University

the academia playbook: “we work a lot with faculty members that seek out grant opportunities. Granting agencies, such as National Institute of Health,

wanted to be our project manager was

will put out a call for proposals along

actually our solutions architect, so he

the lines of ‘we have a need. Write your

really decided to stretch his skills.” He

response, and we may or may not give

reflects that, “one of the reasons why

you money to do the research’. We

this worked is that we had the business

decided to do something similar within

unit say they wanted to be part of it as

our own organization and call it a ‘call

well. They actually brought the problem

for participation’.” The team drafted up

to us. They wanted to forecast demand

a call for participation, asking for appli-

for the Summer sessions so that they

cations and solutions for AWS machine

would know how many classes to

learning and data lake storage. “The re-

schedule and how many adjunct pro-

sponse was interesting,” chuckles Bolt.

fessors to hire.” Regardless of the level

“We have seven participants from our

of success the project achieves, Bolt is

technology office, and the person who

excited to both broaden the horizons

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and skillsets of the participants, and

a campus-wide CRM are just two of

to use it as a springboard for the next

the many projects on Bolt’s desk. He

initiative: exploring applications for

reflects that, “one of the biggest things

Amazon Alexa. “It’s going to be done

I’ve been involved with the past year

by our Director of Development,” Bolt

has been restarting our IT govern-

says. “He wants to invest in Alexa skills

ance structure. There’s not necessar-

and figure out where those fit in our

ily a command and control model in

environment, because smart speakers

the university. So, when it comes to a

are everywhere in our personal lives.

finite resource such as IT, we have a

Trying to figure out where they best

lot of demands placed on us to deliver

fit in an educational environment is

x, y and z, and without structure as

definitely an interest.”

to which large projects we should be

Of course, finding applications for AWS and planning the rollout of

working on and where we’re going, the gap in stakeholder support creates a w w w.bo i se st a te. ed u

fair amount of chaos.” To solve this, over the past year Bolt and his committee co-chair, Boise’s Dean of Extended Studies, have put together a list of large development projects. The system has added structure, Bolt explains that “getting that framework put into place has been a good thing. It’s been a year-long process to get that set up and I think we’ll benefit from that. So will the university. Because we’re working on their goals. Not necessarily our goals. And that’s hugely beneficial to 18

all parties.”

“It’s great that we have a scope for what we want to deliver, an area we want to deliver to, and a partner in a particular school on campus that’s willing to work with us,” he says. Bolt’s team is currently in the procurement phase. Hoping to learn from their experiences with AWS, Bolt estimates “we’ll shorten that process from 18 months down to a four-or-five-month process. We’ve learned a lot, and I think we’ve learned how to partner better with areas on campus to expedite things like this. So, we’re hoping to have a technology and a path chosen by early summer.

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“This has a chance of being a trans-

tory of an institution he knows like the

formational project for us because it

back of his hand. “Our challenges and

essentially creates a CRM with a very

successes over the past ten years

long lifecycle.” The Boise State CRM

have put us in a spot where we can be

will manage student data, allowing the

successful with something as large as

university to “know how to best advise

a campus-wide CRM.”

its students by pulling information from its systems of record. That can really help us understand the entire makeup of the individual,” says Bolt. Looking back on a career of large technological changes, incremental progress and unique challenges, Bolt looks forward to another exciting chapter in the hisw w w.bo i se st a te. ed u

Boise State University 1910 University Dr. Boise Idaho 83725-1402 T +1 208-426-5774 www.boisestate.edu