Bates joined USS in 2020 after serving as the director of information technology (IT) at the Lundquist College of Business for more than nine years. At the college, he managed seven staff responsible for all its IT operations. During his tenure, the college undertook several major projects including the implementation of virtual desktop computing on campus, infrastructure design of the new Naito building in Portland, a complete lab redesign in the Chiles Hall, and the creation of a distance education space in the Lillis Business Complex.

 

Bates has spent more than 35 years in IT management positions, the last 25 years in higher education. He has worked at both the campus and college level, and in each of those roles has managed service-oriented professionals in support of helpdesk and desktop support, computer lab management, account and access provisioning, infrastructure design and engineering, web services, and knowledge management. Prior to higher education, he spent 12 years in various management roles with Federated Department Stores, working in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Atlanta.

 

Bates is an MBA graduate from the Paul Merage School of Business at the University of California, Irvine, with an undergraduate degree in economics from the University of California, San Diego. He was also selected to participate in the Educause Frye Leadership Institute in 2009 and presented a paper on virtual desktop infrastructure computing at the Educause national conference in 2011.