Page 39 - Campus Technology, March/April 2019

Linda Buckley
Nicholson stressed that a high-quality student experience reflects the quality of the CRM sys- tem for all: “The students’ experience can only be excellent if the teams that support them within the university are also having an excel- lent experience,” he pointed out. “Every hour spent struggling with a spreadsheet, report or old technology is an hour not spent with a stu- dent, faculty member, parent, alumnus, appli- cant or donor.” So, a distinguishing feature of GU360 development practice has been the high level of involvement of the business offices, fac- ulty and advisers.
During the ambitious project development year, the Georgetown team identified an important challenge in trying to integrate Salesforce with legacy systems of record: Sys- tems of record are not typically designed to give a 360-degree view, though they do tend to use data in very specific ways. For example, GU360 leverages its identity management (IDM) system to provision accounts and update bio-demographic data. However, IDM was originally created to provision e-mail and populate the directory. It was missing key ele- ments of data needed for the 360-degree view. As a result, the development team had to adjust its plan to run all integrations through its identity management system. It had to build some direct integrations with the legacy systems.
GU360 is now fully integrated with the SIS and other systems of record. It is capable of delivering timely information and responding securely to user needs. This best-in-class imple- mentation sets a new standard of comprehen- siveness for CRM in higher education.
Meg Lloyd is a freelance writer based in Northern California.
“Just as they do at home, our
students here expect modern,
consumer-grade technologies and data information
systems.”
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