Managing Information Technology

Case Study I-3 • The VoIP Adoption at Butler University 155

1/04 2/04 3/04

Began systematic plan to
replace data network over
three years

IR Telephony

Evaluation Team

formed

User Advisory

Group formed

User Advisory Group & IR

Telephony Evaluation

Team attended

SUPERCOMM telephony

conference in Chicago Issued formal RFP and had meetings with various

vendors

Vendors scored on features,

vendors, and implementation

partners; Evaluation of finances

and options with CFO

Implementation planning

begins with Berbee;

System build begins;

Hardware ordered and

installation begins

User pilot

conducted with

40 phones over

3 weeks

Delivery of phone

sets; Decided to delay

implementation

cutover date

Miscellaneous clean-up

as well as 2nd training

session for faculty and

staff

Hired Dietrich Lockard

Group to assist in needs

analysis including student

surveys

Needs Analysis complete;

results presented to

management and RFP

started

Vendor presentations

along with customer site

visits for Mitel, Nortel,

Cisco

Decide to go with Cisco

and Berbee and start

developing contract based

on RFP

Contracts signed; Revised

network infrastructure

replacement plan; Berbee

assigns Project Manager;

IP Implementation Team

formed

Completed network replacement and

wiring upgrades; Training sessions

offered to faculty and staff; Week from

hell occurs June 13th–20th

July 11th actual

cutover to new

system

4/04 5/04 6/04 7/04 8/04 9/04 10/04 11/04 12/04 1/05 2/05 3/05 4/05 5/05 6/05 7/05 8/05 9/05

EXHIBIT 5 Project Milestones: January 2004–August 2005

One of the options allowed for in the Berbee contract
was for Butler to alter the implementation plan to allow for a
split roll-out: phase one of the roll-out could be done in the
summer to make sure things went according to plan, and
then the phase two users would be implemented during the
Thanksgiving holiday break. However, the team decided to
push through and not let the unexpected setbacks create
more damage than necessary, and the decision was made to
delay the cutover date by just two weeks.

We decided not to split the roll-out since everyone

was motivated to do it all at once. We didn’t want to

kill that spirit. Also, we felt that creating more work

during Thanksgiving time would place even more of

a burden on our team members and the vendors.

—Scott Kincaid, CIO

On July 11 the system went live! SBC migrated all
Butler’s phone numbers to Time Warner Telecom, who
then routed all calls to the new system, and Centrex was
turned off. Calls got through to the right places and the
new call center software managed the calls. Only a few

lines and features were missed, so the planning, testing

and roll-out was clearly valuable. However, none of the

departmental burglar alarms worked! The alarm panels

depended on analog phone lines to communicate with

the campus police department and were now being con-

nected via a Cisco analog-to-VoIP gateway device.

However, the alarm panels, based on 1970’s technology,

would not work even with the analog-to-VoIP gateway;

apparently Butler had not tested the devices before

implementation. So Butler found some unused Centrex

lines, and the alarms were reconnected using traditional

analog circuits.

Otherwise, the newly converged, in-house voice-

and-data system was fully functional. No one reported any

problems with the voice quality.

Having been a part of various large system changes

in the past, I have seen my fair share of “blips” and

overall catastrophes and I was pleasantly surprised

that I have seen no such issues from this transition, at

least not yet.”

—Kathy Parsons, University Budget Director