By Samuel Greengard
The rapidadoption rate for mobile devices has created both new opportunities and new challengesfor IT departments and businesses. According to a June study conducted by ITmarket research firm IDC, more than three-quarters of businesses still providecorporate-liable smartphones to employees, but about half have transitioned toa bring-your-own-device (BYOD) approach to tablets.
Mobiletechnology provides "new opportunities for businesses to build closerrelationships with their customers, but it also comes with a whole host ofchallenges around how to manage these devices in the enterprise," saidMeredith Whalen, a senior vice president for IT Executive & IndustryResearch at IDC. Key issues include: understanding who is using BYOD devices,what business applications are running on them, and whether it’s possible toremotely wipe the phone or tablet if it is lost or stolen.
The study,which tapped 52 CIOs and senior IT executives from the United States andEurope, found that company executives?as well as those in sales, IT andmarketing job functions?were the biggest users of smartphones and tabletswithin organizations. For corporate-liable smartphones, 73 percent oforganizations pay the entire mobile service bill (voice and data) directly tothe mobile service provider. Likewise, 71 percent of companies pay the entiremobile service plan for corporate-liable tablets.
Notsurprisingly, the upswing in mobile device use is driving fundamental changes inIT. Survey respondents indicated that it is necessary to mitigate risk andsupport costs associated with letting employees bring their own devices.
Overall, 45percent of the companies polled provide limited IT help-desk support forbusiness applications on individual-liable smartphones, while 42 percent saythey provide limited IT help-desk support for business applications on individual-liabletablets. Both groups indicated that they relay hardware support issues back tomobile service providers.
At the otherend of the spectrum, 33 percent of the organizations surveyed offer no supportfor individual-liable smartphones, and 44 percent provide no support forindividual-liable tablets. Many executives indicated that they view tablets as asecondary device to a laptop or desktop computer.
IDC notedthat, by including tablets in the same 2 1/2-year refresh cycle as smartphonesrather than the cycle of laptops, organizations plunk down an additional 1percent of their IT budget every year for tablet refreshes.
Whalenobserved that many organizations are currently "working through theirmobile device strategy and policy issues." In order to maximize the oddsfor success, IDC recommends that IT executives establish a governance committee,including finance, HR and legal, to outline a comprehensive BYOD strategy. Thisprocess should produce clearly defined use policies and cost-allocationmethods.
In addition,she recommends that IT executives "identify the costs associated withdeveloping and supporting multiple mobile platforms, and apply a governancestrategy to mobile application development efforts to ensure projects areprioritized based on the highest value-add to the enterprise."
A policyframework should define which employees are given tablets, whether they aremobile or office workers, and the extent to which they are creating andconsuming content, Whalen concluded.
