Mobile strategy presents challenges
For years, companies have debated whether to let employees expense their personal cell phones rather than issuing a separate phone for business use, and if so, how much control to have over them in terms of vendors and carriers. It was an easy decision when folks used pagers (remember those?), which were issued to an employee. Corporate cell phones started as an expansion of pagers. However, now with the explosion of mobile devices, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) brings new questions to the table, because people already have phones. Here’s some of the issues:
- Developing apps: If there are corporate apps that you want on the mobile device, a proliferation of platforms means your developers now have to develop for iPhone, Android, Windows Phone … and in some cases the fragmentation in manufacturer hardware makes it hard to build an app that will work across the devices (Android being a good example).
- Security and management: If folks are accessing corporate data and email on their phones and tablets, do you want those to be personal devices? What if the device is lost; do you have the means to wipe it remotely? Can you enforce a password to use the device? Can you enforce the apps on the device?
- Device use: for government employees (state, local, and federal), calls over government-funded phones are to be strictly for business purposes. Some in private industry take the same approach.
- Frequency of Change: Devices and platforms considered “high tech” just several years ago are now often seen as dinosaurs. This volatility makes development and security issues a constantly moving target.
While not necessarily a complete list, these challenges help highlight that developing a mobile strategy requires planning and deliberation.
