Businesses today, across different sectors are shifting focus towards a model of information communications from any device no matter where the user is located. This shift is result of growing business demands and the need for employees to be able to meet the business demands at all times, under any circumstances.
Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) is a today like a household name in businesses who intend to leverage the most out of Unified Communication (UC). The next generation businesses and their employees prefers to use their own smart mobile devices to access corporate mails, instant messaging, audio/video calling, conferencing, web browsing, calendars synchronizing, reminders etc. BYOD being a key driver of UC has changed the very foundation of UC over the years, by replacing a multi feature desk phone with smart mobile devices thereby simplifying communication and user experience. UC is a vast concept and involves various modes of smart communication like voice mail, instant messaging, multimodal conferencing, social integration, audio-video communication etc. As these become easily accessible with the availability of high-speed internet and broad-band diffusion, BYOD becomes a much desired concept where users make use of mobile devices of their own choice and specification thus making the most of next generation UC.
BYOD offers benefits of convenience and speed. You can work on your phone, tablet etc, at anytime, from anywhere. It also a huge cost saving generator to enterprises; employees generally purchase their desired device and data plan and use it for their official work. This helps companies to cut down on technical equipment costs. It also enables employees to be more productive as they would work on devices that they are more familiar with, and are capable to work from anywhere.
One challenge with the BYOD trend is of course security breach. Without sufficient security measures in place, confidential information of an enterprise on an employee’s personal gadgets for is a risk. However, measures to fill up the security loop holes like Mobile Device Management (MDM) help in smooth functioning of BYOD. IT teams in companies also provide detailed security requirements like password protection, prohibit the installation of certain applications, encrypt all data etc., to the employees for each type of personal device connected to the corporate network.
BYOD can be implemented on a shared liability model for the personal devices used for official purposes. This is incorporated by conducting a course for employees that would outline their personal responsibilities to the company and its data and be accountable for any issues or incidents that would arise from not adhering to the rules of the company. Without interfering with employee personal usage, enterprises can also take minimal corporate control over the devices by conducting a back-end auditing for the use of corporate data.
If you have already implemented or planning to implement BYOD in your company, consider the ways in which you can take the edge off risks and convert it into an advantage for the company and employees.
