The BYOD Conundrum

[jaguba]

By Moe Arnaiz, CEO of @eMOBUS

If you're like most IT leaders, you're probably being knocked around a bit by the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) model. On paper, it makes so much sense: employees choose the technology they love —iPhones, Droids, etc.— and the organization saves money because the carrier service and device costs are offloaded to the end user.

But in practice, BYOD can also mean BYOV, "bring your own vendor," and that can mean managing wildly disparate costs and seemingly endless variables in vendor requirements. And sometimes BYOD doesn't mean UYOD, "using your own device," and IT managers will in fact be managing and paying for devices that are dormant at best and MIA at worst.

In spite of these challenges, it's clear that BYOD is here to stay. Every single employee brings their own device to work, they bring them everywhere, and IT leaders will have to find ways not only to adapt to the new model, but also to make it more cost and time effective.

And if you feel like you're swimming against the current in this challenge, you're not alone. Just last year, a study based on the insights of more than 1,500 IT leaders and 2,000 IT professionals from companies of all sizes exposed the fact that while the BYOD movement is in full swing, the value being delivered to organizations using BYOD models was "mediocre… [as] nearly half of both IT leaders and IT professionals believe their organizations are either achieving middle-of-the-road effectiveness or are completely ineffective across a variety of factors".[1]

On the plus side, BYOD is keeping employees more engaged and available. As the "consumerization" of enterprise technology increases, that technology becomes more and more integrated into people's everyday lives, which means people's work and personal lives become more integrated, too. The goal of BYOD is to enable employees to work using the technology they already know and enjoy, while maintaining enough corporate oversight to ensure that the technology is consistent with a company's culture, business processes, and security needs.

In a recent article in The Wall Street Journal, the CIO of Google Ben Fried said, "I remember years ago, when I joined Google, they allowed people to use whatever they thought was relevant to them, when everyone else gave people a black laptop and a BlackBerry and said, 'You are going to do it our way.' The conventional wisdom of our industry is that we can't have efficiency and choice, we can't have security and choice. I have discovered during my time at Google that is a complete falsehood."[2]

Fried's take on choice strikes at the heart of the matter and the true meaning of BYOD. Once the new iPhone and Android devices hit the market, the bar was raised and employees began wanting a choice - not to be told they had to use a Blackberry. This was great news for Apple and Google and a push toward democratizing technology consumption in the enterprise.

However, somewhere along the lines this very practical concept of letting employees choose the technology they love, to increase productivity, began to be confused with making the employee responsible for everything: device, support and costs.

There is a difference between giving employees a choice and giving them a choice along with a burden. BYOD was introduced to increase employee satisfaction and workability, but not to hand-off costs and support requirements to end users for a tool that is critical to business. In most cases that approach is not sustainable and costs company's more money and time long-term. Often referred to as "stepping over dollars to pick up pennies."

What is the answer then? How can you allow choice, control costs and simplify support, all while staying focused on your core business objectives? How can you empower employees with a BYOD model that does not add to their technology "housekeeping" duties? Adopting BYOD today is a must — but it should be a modern and sustainable BYOD approach that considers structure and business continuity, an approach that lets employees do their jobs more easily, and lets management do what it does best—manage the distractions. When devices are managed at the corporate level, friction is decreased, allowing IT to adequately support users and manage costs efficiently, while employees have their freedom and flexibility to focus on their job.

So how do you quantify BYOD efficiency? In our experience, smartphones should cost between $40 to $50 per device per month in a well-managed environment. But most IT leaders say their organizations are not effective in achieving BYOD's promise of lower IT expenses (62%) and higher customer satisfaction (60%). Mobility and BYOD are disrupting IT services organizations, but employees using their own mobile devices for business is only growing as the workforce expands.

What BYOD Options do you have? Do you control devices to ensure easier management and streamlined support? Do you relinquish all responsibility and reimburse? Can you somehow enable freedom of choice and still manage the distractions — like costs and day-to-day support? — Learn more about the breadth and depth of BYOD options available to organizations and explore the Hybrid BYOD Model in "The Hybrid Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) Deployment: Embracing the "Dual Life" of Mobile Solutions in...." You could finally solve that timeless conundrum of having one's cake and eating it, too.

[1] TEKsystems Study Reveals BYOD Policies and Practices Leave Organizations Exposed

[2] How Google Handles IT for Its Workers — Letting Employees Choose Their Own Technology is Beneficial