Happiness Is ... Bringing Your Own Computer Devices to Work
Online business community Entrepreneur Country claims "it's surprising how something apparently as simple as allowing staff to bring their own computer devices (BYOD) to use at work can boost employee morale."
That comes from a piece was written by Charles Black, chief executive of cloud computing firm Nasstar, one of Entrepreneur Country's partners. Based on its own poll of 300 bosses of small and medium sized businesses, Mr. Black wrote, "Three quarters of bosses in our sample told us that by allowing their staff to use their own smart phones, laptops or tablets in the workplace positioned their firms as 'flexible and attractive employers.'" In addition, "Around two thirds of SME chiefs told us they already allowed their staff to use their own devices for work purposes. ... The same number said they had written policies in place for staff wishing to use their own devices at work."
The BYOD debate was also aired on the TechRepublic site where two CIOs explained their thinking.
Paul Green, director of business information solutions at Sheffield City Council told said, "The best device — when considered in light of factors such as integration with back-end systems, information sharing and security — may or may not be a consumer one."
Support, tax and licensing liabilities as well as responsibility, security, maintenance and management issues need to be considered. Mr Green concludes that before implementing BYOD, IT departments should "first consider how they can make the computing experience better for staff."
Jos Creese, Hampshire County Council CIO, told TechRepublic, "You don't resist inevitable IT trends, whether they are cloud, BYOD, social networking — you find a way of harnessing them and using them to allow the organisation to do what it needs to do."
This, according to Mr. Creese applies to everything from staff using their iPhones and iPads at work to looking for the best options to work flexibly as a means to increasing productivity. Encouraging choice between personal and corporate issued devices keeps BYOD manageable. "It's absolutely essential that IT is seen as an enabler of business change and improvement, not a barrier to it," he said.