BYOD, Bring your own device or also referred to as BYOT, Bring your own Technology, to work is a trend which is getting popular by the day. BYOD means allowing employees to bring their own device (Smartphone, Laptop or Tablet) to work and connecting to company network and work on it. The trend started in 2009 at technology giant Intel.
The trend quickly gained popularity with all IT companies across the globe. When communication became the key factor of in delivery and the global market became shorter by distance and time, the BYOD became the handiest way to deal with the scenario.
When BYOD policy are well defined by the organization it becomes great aspect for companies to connect with their customers and vendors. The resultant of BYOD is improved productivity and morale as employee communicates promptly and efficiently as the comfort to use their device is much easier, hence achieving target or delivering service is easier and efficient, resulting in higher employee morale. The flip side to this is employee taking work home which means less of life beyond work and social dissatisfaction amongst the workforce. Hence cannot emphasize enough the importance of defining clear policy for BYOD in the organization. The policy to be considered by organization should be based on,
- Usability of the device
- Data security
- Reporting
- Culture
The responsible way of you using BYOD can really extract the complete potential of organization and employee, leading to better growth and better service delivery.
In India the BYOD or BYOT is still in its nascent stage where companies have policy to allow this in certain department or above certain designation. Marketing and sales are the first department that gets this permission due to nature of work. The obvious advantage is cost saving to the company and near real time information. On the contrary companies might use this to disrupt social life of the employee. So responsibly handling BYOD is something Indian companies would have to grow on.
There have been scenarios where employees are being forced to work in wee hours of the night because the company feels that the employee has access to his device the entire time, this causes bad social environment for the employee lowering their morale and hence adversely affecting productivity. On the other hand there are companies which invest in upgrading employees devices(paying difference amount for mobile device) or peripheral cost (example taking care of the internet bill on the phone), helping them to do work better and making them feel taken care, this improves their productivity.
India is slow to catch on but quick to innovate, having seeing the obvious it also has challenges that no organization can ignore like data security, information leak etc., which company is trying to overcome by providing secured environment for employees to work on this and where there are challenges there are opportunities for business to innovate and thrive. There has be surge in enterprise solution trying to facilitate this be it connecting to ERP software or setting up secured communication or tracking sales team.
We have been fortunate enough to work on solutions like corporate what’s app which would not only work on secured environment but make sure the data is on your company server, making the organization secure and employee comfortable.
There are solution like ERP dash boards and ERP extensions allowing decision making on the go, resulting improved productivity and morale boost. This kind of solution is now become the key for organization growth across the globe and technologies to build these solutions are sought after globally.
We at CDN Solutions Group have developed Enterprise communicator, tablet based meeting manager, sales force and ERP based dashboards, for organization that want to effectively use BYOD across the system.
Challenges are always there but every challenge would lead to a opportunity to explore. BYOD has done the same , you like it or not, it is here to stay.
This year, we are exhibiting in Gitex 2016 Dubai for the 8th consecutive time to show latest trends of technology and solutions. You can meet us at stand SR-E8 in Sheikh Rashid Hall, Dubai World Trade Centre for all new technology solutions.