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Let Your Staff Bring Their Own Equipment To The Office And Reap The Benefits

Posted on: April 11th, 2014 by Walid Abou-Halloun
Categories: Business. Tags: BYOD.

Let Your Staff Bring Their Own Equipment To The Office And Reap The Benefits

If you haven’t heard the acronym BYOD, you’d be forgiven for thinking it had something to do with exercise. This new trend though has nothing to do with your body. BYOD stands for Bring Your Own Device and is the systematic approach of allowing staff members to use their own devices as part of the work environment.
What’s the big deal with that, you ask?
If you’ve ever had to juggle a personal phone as well as a work phone while hefting around a laptop just in case you need to get away from your desktop at some point during the day, you’ll understand the immediate attraction to staff of combining their work life with their personal life on the one device. Companies are reaping the benefits of not having to invest in devices for each of their staff members and increased retention due to greater flexibility.

Advantages of BYOD

  • Reduced Investment in Equipment. Because your staff are using their own personal devices for their work duties, it’s no longer necessary for companies to invest in new devices every couple of years for the entire staff. Some compensation in terms of support and up front cost is necessary however the outlay is nowhere near as much as the double-up system previously.
  • Greater Flexibility. Implementing BYOD systems into a company means that every device must be able to access the company’s systems from anywhere at anytime. This means that staff who want to work from home can do so much with much more ease. This saves the company turnover costs as well as office infrastructure costs as more environments become about ‘hot-desking’. Dimension Data has 600 workers in it’s Rocks-based offices with 100 more due to come in this year. Instead of moving offices, they’ve been able to remain in their current ones, thanks to flexible working arrangements.
  • Greater Retention Of Staff. Strongly related to the increase in flexibility provided by BYOD systems is the ability to retain staff longer. Working parents or young people wanting to travel are especially appreciative of the ability to continue work as well as prioritise other aspects of life.
  • Disaster Recovery Plan. Suncorp was able to continue 3000 of its 5000 evacuated staff members working from home during the Brisbane floods in 2011 thanks to a BYOD system. Removing your data from the risk zone of your office is always a good idea (and one reason we recommend hosted email, hosted exchange and cloud storage); seamlessly allowing your staff to continue working from wherever they can find to set up is an added benefit of BYOD.

While the benefits are clear, the difficulties and potential complications are even clearer. Where does support for the device by the company start and finish? How does the company protect their data without impeding on the staff member’s personal information? How can each person access the software they need from different operating systems? Here we outline the advantages and disadvantages of the BYOD structure. Could it bring savings to your business?

Disadvantages of BYOD

  • Increased Risk Of Data Security. If you want to restrict an employee’s access to data, currently all that’s required is to ensure they don’t get in the building. With a BYOD system that changes. Employees have access to company data and they have it at all times of the day and weekend. There are software programs designed to minimise this risk.
  • Increased Complexity For IT Support. Drawing a clear line between a person’s personal data and the company’s information is necessary to ensure that support is provided by the company for the right issues. If an individual wants to download certain apps onto their phone, they should be allowed to, however they can’t then request support for those apps from the company. Some companies use a software that requires a user to login before they access company information and keeps the ‘company’ stuff separate from the ‘personal’ stuff. This also helps for wiping data at the end of a person’s tenure with the organisation.
  • Additional Costs Required To Manage Risks and Complexity. While an organisation may save money when it comes to buying new equipment for their staff, there is initially an additional cost in setting up systems to manage the risks and complexities involved in BYOD systems.

How much benefit is there to both your company and your staff in a flexible, BYOD system? Weigh up the outcomes to decide if transitioning to a BYOD organisation is right for your company. The smaller you are, the easier it is! If you need assistance in weighing your options, contact Complete Cloud experts.

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