Business Chief USA March 2019
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BOISE STATE UNIVERSITY<br />
138<br />
“THE LIFESPAN OF<br />
A CUSTOMER FOR US<br />
COULD BE 60 YEARS<br />
LONG, BUT RIGHT<br />
NOW WE ONLY HAVE<br />
A CRM FOR THE<br />
BOOKENDS OF THAT<br />
LIFECYCLE: APPLIC-<br />
ANTS AND ALUMNI”<br />
—<br />
Brian Bolt,<br />
Deputy <strong>Chief</strong> Information Office,<br />
Boise State University<br />
of the technologies we have may have<br />
reached the end of their lifecycle.”<br />
Over the course of his career at Boise,<br />
Bolt has faced each of these challenges<br />
and more.<br />
Though his career at Boise State began<br />
working with the Novell NetWare<br />
operating system, by 2007 Bolt could<br />
see that transformation and transition<br />
were long overdue. “At one point<br />
in time, universities were looked to as<br />
leaders with regard to technology and<br />
its adoption,” he says, “but I think in the<br />
90s the corporate world started to get<br />
ahead.” Technology, Bolt points out,<br />
became more entrenched and slower<br />
moving in academia. “So, we held<br />
onto our Novell infrastructure for a lot<br />
longer than the corporate world ever<br />
did. Which is fine. It’s just kind of the<br />
way that universities work, and there’s<br />
a reason why universities have been<br />
around for a long time. They’re typically<br />
deliberate about their decision-making<br />
process.” Boise’s relationship with<br />
Novell came to an end as a result of<br />
reduced reliability due to vendors not<br />
being able to invest as much money in<br />
maintenance updates. “We were probably<br />
one of the last schools running<br />
MARCH <strong>2019</strong>
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