Thirty-three million people are buying new iPads this year, according to Gartner. Another 27 million or so will buy tablets from other manufacturers. And more than 643 million people will buy new smartphones, according to ABI Research.
If any of these folks work for your company -- and, chances are, they do -- they've probably already started clamoring to get access to their corporate email and applications on these mobile devices.
There are three potential responses open to you: Issue them a company-approved mobile device, ignore them and hope they go away, or agree to support their device.
The first option is not only expensive, but it forces employees to carry two devices around with them. The second option, while tempting, will only work for so long.
So, many companies are looking at option three: BYOD -- Bring Your Own Device.
According to a recent Forrester report, more than half of US information workers already pay for their smartphones and monthly plans.
A report by mobile device management company Good Technology claims that 60 percent of financial companies require employees to pay for their own devices and monthly charges. According to Good Technology, companies that allow BYOD save an average of $80 for each employee who switches from a company-owned device to a personal device.
Of course, it's all to Good Technology's benefit if BYOD expands -- the vendor provides tools that allow companies to ensure that corporate data and information remains secure, even on personal devices.
Mobile device management vendors like Good Technology typically offer products that segregate company data, email, and apps and allow for remote wiping of just the corporate information if the device is lost or the employee leaves the company -- while leaving the personal stuff alone.
Employees benefit from BYOD, too. Many of us are on all-you-can-eat plans. For example, with my iPhone, I get unlimited data and unlimited calling for a flat monthly fee. It wouldn't cost me anything extra to use my phone for work -- and it would save me the hassle of carrying two different devices and two sets of chargers, giving out two different cell numbers, and having to check two places for messages. Plus, when I picked my smartphone, I picked one that I liked and that was easy for me to use, and if there was a problem with it I'd return it to the retailer -- I wouldn't expect my company to take care of it for me.
Consumers also buy cool new gadgets, while corporations tend to issue older-generation devices.
BYOD is not just about smartphones and tablets. Letting employees use their own laptops can also improve satisfaction and productivity, while saving companies money.
But if you're not careful, BYOD can actually wind up costing your company money -- 33 percent more, on average -- than just buying new devices for everyone.
According to research from Aberdeen Group, companies that take advantage of volume discounts can get mobile devices for an average of $60 per month per employee. But a company that reimburses employees for using devices that they bought themselves will spend $70 a month. Plus, there are the reimbursement reports, each of which costs an average of $18 to process. Plus, there are additional security, compliance, and help desk costs for supporting all these devices.
Here are some tips for making BYOD work:
Let the employees pay for their own devices and monthly plans, and reimburse them just for extraordinary, business-related expenses such as roaming charges on international trips.
Be clear and upfront about what the company will pay for, and what will be up to the employee to pay, to avoid nasty surprises.
Set up security policies and compliance guidelines.
Use mobile management tools or remote desktops to ensure all corporate data is safe and secure,and include the cost of these tools when you consider implementing a BYOD program.
Make BYOD a choice, not a mandate. Employees with out-of-date corporate-issued devices may be happy to switch to their own smartphones, but if the switch is mandatory they may resent the loss of a perk.
--Maria Korolov is president of Trombly International, an editorial services company that provides coverage of emerging technologies and markets. She has been a journalist for more than 20 years.
"Imagine the anti-BYOD enterprise where employees just go ahead and use their own devices anyway."
@Joe: I think one reason why companies are forced to develop a BYOD policy is because a large number of employees are already using their personal devices for business use irrespective of how secure and reliable they are. Especially with the trend of working from home, there's very little control the company has on the devices the employee is using.
I see, this can be applicable in small companies that don`t have enough money to invest in their own IT systems. I know that is often the case with contractors who should use their own devices in the execution of their work.
hounhosp, - Guess you're right about companies finding it difficult to allow BYOD when it comes to larger organizations with sufficient resources of their own. However for smaller companies sometimes they indeed give you a job on condition that you shall use your own machine though software will be provided. This was the case at my first job. In this case they should compensate accordingly.
@hounhosp: I was writing about what would be fair. As for what is, I guess the employees will further have to fight for their rights until the right thing is done,
Hi, Maria. Thanks for sharing this background info.
Of course, there's a big difference between the negligent employee and the malicious employee. I'm not sure those statistics should be lumped together. It's a lot easier to control for the security risks of negligent employees than those of determined malicious employees (in some ways, anyway).
Re: "I personally don't mind employees browsing the web during the day, as long as you have proper web content to block malicious categories of pages and the employee isn't abusing it."
Indeed, Scucci. Depending upon the job, I'd aver that allowing employees' occasional personal web browsing is simply part of the cost of doing business.
(Of course, security measures are important too, as you mention.)
The ThinkerNet does not reflect the views of TechWeb. The ThinkerNet is an informal means of communication to members and visitors of the Internet Evolution site. Individual authors are chosen by Internet Evolution to blog. Neither Internet Evolution nor TechWeb assume responsibility for comments, claims, or opinions made by authors and ThinkerNet bloggers. They are no substitute for your own research and should not be relied upon for trading or any other purpose.
In the fall of 2011, around 160,000 students in 190 countries enrolled in a Stanford-sponsored online course about artificial intelligence. About 23,000 completed the course and got certificates, including 248 who got a perfect score. The university offered the same course the old-fashioned way to students sitting in Stanford classrooms. None of the those students got a perfect score.
I don't wear a watch. I haven't worn one years. If I'm carrying a phone -- any phone -- I always know what time it is and don't have to worry about time zones or daylight savings time. And I don't want to have an iPod or an iPhone that I can wear on my wrist. Again: Why? If I want to sport one while jogging, there are plenty of bands you can already buy that do that.
Organizations are expending enormous resources to improve their internal productivity by implementing cloud, adding collaborative applications, and investing in analytics solutions. Individually, we can improve our own productivity, even during sometimes lengthy meetings, by using free note-taking apps like Evernote or Microsoft OneNote.
New tools like laptops, tablets, smartphone, and wireless connectivity let us work from San Diego to Katmandu, and anywhere in between. But time management remains a problem.
A survey by JD Powers found that customer interest in product features is lessening as phones evolve. Rather than features, price is driving purchases, and that change could have a dramatic impact on how IT departments secure these devices.
The bring-your-own-device approach isn’t suited to monitoring of enterprise equipment and processes. In these cases, it is up to IT to come forward with gear suited to the task.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Showing results is the best way to win over social business doubters, according to Mary Maida, Medtronic lead information solutions manager. Internet Evolution's Mitch Wagner interviewed Maida at the E2 Innovate conference.
Companies need to take advantage of new technologies to simplify interfaces, improve capabilities, and enhance back-office processes. But they can't upgrade their Websites too often.
Big-data and analytics tools enable marketers to understand customers as individuals, identifying unmet needs and addressing each customer as a "segment of one," says John Kennedy, VP corporate marketing, IBM.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The IBM Smarter Commerce Global Summit in Monaco kicked into high gear today, and we've already begun to see news emerging from that lovely city-state by the sea.
Expert Integrated Systems: Changing the Experience & Economics of IT In this e-book, we take an in-depth look at these expert integrated systems -- what they are, how they work, and how they have the potential to help CIOs achieve dramatic savings while restoring IT's role as business innovator. READ THIS eBOOK
your weekly update of news, analysis, and
opinion from Internet Evolution - FREE! REGISTER HERE
Wanted! Site Moderators Internet Evolution is looking for a handful of readers to help moderate the message boards on our site – as well as engaging in high-IQ conversation with the industry mavens on our thinkerNet blogosphere. The job comes with various perks, bags of kudos, and GIANT bragging rights. Interested?
To save this item to your list of favorite Internet Evolution content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
Email This
