Understanding BYOD

 

Srinivas Tadigadapa, Director – Enterprise Solutions Sales, Intel South Asia

Excerpts from the interview:

1) What strategy should be followed while planning and implementing the BYOD policy at workplace?
BYOD initiatives need to contribute directly to the company’s bottom line, while catering to the employee’s needs for IT consumerisation. Intel’s research found that security, manageability and remote wipe capabilities are valued by IT decision makers as the top three requirements for a successful consumerisation program. We suggest adopting new approaches to BYOD through five steps:
• Understand the powerful forces shaping consumerisation today – the younger workers that grew up with technology will have higher expectation.
• Rethink user computing to optimise the compute experience and keep users productive on any device.
• Create an inclusive approach by addressing both employee owned and employer-provided devices.
• Support employee-owned devices with best practices that address a user-centered strategy and the inherent security issues around BYOD.
• Find the right tools for the job through recognising that there is no one-size-fits-all solution for consumerisation.
2) We live in a BYOD world today, where use of smart phones and tablets are common. To what extent can an organisation control the use of personal devices in workplace?
By leveraging the existing IT investment and taking advantages of the trusted and familiar technology platform such as IA, companies can extend support to personal devices with new programs without interrupting the entire computing experiences – all while gaining greater security and manageability. Control comes through a) technical efficiency, b) usage policies and c) involving employees in creation of policies to encourage behavior modulation and accept training.
• Security advantages through involving employees in policy creation
• Quick refresh – oldest device is 2 years
• Less data exposed – device compromise won’t create much trouble
• More control factors, users help with security settings
• Mobility improves availability risk by improving time to respond, time to contain and time to recover from events
• Involve users in creating a policy, get employees thinking about what they would allow others to do, encourage constructive criticism and improve openness to policy compliance
3) Security is often mentioned as one of the biggest problems with BYOD. What are the other big concerns?
IT managers were asked to rank the top three barriers to allowing certain types of employee-owned computers, tablets, or smart phones from being used for work. Respondents chose from a list of eight statements that addressed – support, compatibility, standardization, customisability, compliance, security. To overcome these, there is a need to drive agility through platform-agnostic applications. Business decision makers can set mandates to ensure the safety of corporate data. Filtering information and tying available information to user privileges can also help to safeguard sensitive data. Employees need to be made aware of policies through active involvement, as explained in the previous response.
4) What is the future potential of BYOD in terms of engaging, retaining and building productive workforce?
The desire among employees to bring personal devices to work is symptomatic of the gap between what employees expect and what IT organisations provide—and it’s contributing to the risk level. Because employers either don’t offer the right technology or are slow to do so, personal device usage remains a chronic challenge: Employees are increasingly using non-supported devices and therefore exposing employers to a number of potential security holes. To address the gap in expectations, IT organizations must rethink their approach to managing consumerisation. With a user-centered strategy that better aligns the at-work technology experience with the at-home experience, you can help improve employee morale and increase productivity, all while gaining greater IT security and control.