Boyer & Associates is growing its CRM consulting team. Please join us in welcoming Wisconsin native Lance Squires as a Power Platform/CRM Solution Architect.
Spurred on by a life-long desire to learn new things, Squires spent his teen years dabbling in computer coding and building or fixing computers for family members.
“My dad just installed a sense of curiosity and the desire to understand the world around me,” Squires said. “He made me always question the things around me and allowed me to want to understand things in general as well as how things work.”
Fascinated with weather patterns, Squires initially went to the University of North Dakota with the intent of becoming a broadcast meteorologist. Three years into the program, he realized meteorology was more of a hobby than something he wanted to do as a career. Recalling his love of computers, he switched to Information Systems.
His first job in IT came at during his senior year of college when he took a job with the Geek Squad at global retailer Best Buy. “I really got bit by the bug and wanted to keep going with that,” he said.
He started working as a support engineer on Microsoft Dynamics CRM in 2011 and hasn’t looked back since. He spent the first few years in support before shifting to the infrastructure side with a local Microsoft partner. From there he branched out into the delivery side of things as a CRM solution architect.
Squires enjoyed getting his hands in “the nuts and bolts behind an entire systems integration,” he said. “That gave me exposure and allowed me to really grow and understand all the product offerings that are out there.”
One of his biggest projects consisted of helping an enterprise customer replace their document management system across operations. In all, they had 170 different groups to migrate. The process took a year and a half and was still finishing when he left. “There was a go live every other weekend,” he noted.
From the days of CRM 4.0 to today, Squires has watched Microsoft’s technology improve its capabilities and connectivity.
“They’re not afraid to challenge the status quo and come up with innovative solutions,” he said. That mentality lines up very well with his own lifelong desire to continue learning.
Squires is a little wary about the latest advancements in AI, simply because of the lack of governance. He’s looking forward to the day when AI is better trained, and people know how to use it properly.
“I’m very excited to see what the future holds for AI just as long as it’s used in a positive way,” he said.
He sees huge potential for the healthcare industry in particular, with a well-trained AI able to help doctors think more holistically about possible diagnoses.
“People are afraid it’s going to take jobs and I don’t think that’s the case. It’s going to help enhance their jobs,” he added. Voice dictation and Microsoft Copilot’s ability to summarize a Teams call are just two examples he mentioned.
Squires’ love for a new challenge is part of what brought him to Boyer as a CRM solution architect. He spent nearly 11 years with the same partner, but when the job started becoming stagnant, he decided it was time for a change.
“I don’t like being stagnant in one space. I like to always branch out, learn more things, challenge myself and solve puzzles,” he said.
He had partnered with Boyer in the past. When a former coworker suggested he join, the company culture intrigued him.
“I really miss the culture of PO, and Boyer, while its own entity, did resemble some of the same characteristics,” he said. “It was a similar culture … where it’s a small but cohesive team (with) a sense of community.”
Growing up as an only child in a small (500 people) town in Wisconsin, Squires appreciates that community feel. He lives in Bloomington, MN now and spends a lot of his spare time with his two dogs, Callie (a goldendoodle) and Cobie (a golden retriever).
He recently started cross-fit and enjoys hiking, fishing, four-wheeling or messing around with computer code.
The etymology of languages, IT and otherwise, has always interested him as well. He was very involved in choir in high school and college. He also studied abroad in Spain and recently started picking up Korean.
