Keeping Up With Modern Enterprise Mobility

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able to build applications, improve processes, and take accountability for their own mobile ... That includes app-‐lev
 

 

Keeping  Up  With  Modern  Enterprise  Mobility   By  Brian  Albright     Mobility  projects  have  increased  in  scope  and  complexity,  and  they  require  a  more  grass-­‐roots   approach  than  previous  technology  initiatives.    

 

 

Enterprise  mobility  solutions  have  evolved  rapidly  over  the  past  several  years.  The  number  and  type  of   mobile  devices  have  exploded,  there  are  more  operating  system  platforms  available,  lines  are  blurring   between  consumer  and  rugged  devices,  and  many  companies  have  even  adopted  BYOD  programs  for   employee-­‐owned  hardware.  There  are  new  security  concerns  and  solutions,  along  with  cloud-­‐based   applications  and  new  mobile  device  management  options.     Many  enterprise  mobility  strategies,  however,  were  originally  developed  around  older  technology   paradigms.  In  some  cases,  companies  may  never  have  fully  developed  a  mobility  strategy  at  all.  A  guiding   plan  for  a  company’s  approach  to  mobile  deployments  is  important  to  ensure  the  systems  are  secure,   reliable,  and  manageable.  Given  the  complexity  of  the  current  mobility  market,  Field  Technologies   surveyed  a  number  of  leading  solution  vendors  to  find  best  practices  for  developing  a  modern  enterprise   mobility  strategy.     “Every  department  has  a  hand  in  mobile  and  expects  IT  to  deliver  on  and  support  these  demands  at  an   accelerating  pace,”  says  Marco  Nielsen,  VP  of  managed  mobility  services  at  Stratix.  “IT  organizations  face   new  complexities  with  expanding  heterogeneous  technology  populations,  multi-­‐OS  environments,  new  IT   security  and  management  processes,  along  with  how  to  deliver  an  always-­‐on,  always-­‐available   experience.  In  order  for  companies  to  stay  ahead  of  the  curve,  they  need  to  invite  the  business  operations   into  the  mobile  strategy.”     A  significant  new  wrinkle  in  enterprise  mobility  is  the  extension  of  these  solutions  to  employee-­‐owned   devices,  as  well  as  to  mobile  devices  used  by  contract  service  providers,  partners,  or  even  customers.   Using  mobile  device  management  (MDM)  solutions  is  not  as  straightforward  a  solution  as  in  completely   corporate-­‐owned,  homogenous  environments.  “Since  MDM  solutions  require  devices  to  be  first  enrolled   and  managed,  it’s  not  suited  for  extended  mobile  users  such  as  contractors,  dealers,  suppliers,  agencies,   etc.,”  says  Brian  Day,  CEO  of  Apperian.  “Even  BYOD  users  are  beginning  to  reject  MDM  from  being   installed  on  their  phones  just  to  get  access  to  their  corporate  email,  not  wanting  to  give  up  personal   privacy  to  employers.”     Another  challenge  is  the  rise  of  employee-­‐initiated,  sometimes  unofficial,  mobile  deployments.  IT   departments  have  found  it  difficult  to  keep  up  with  the  long  list  of  mobility  projects,  both  internal  and   customer-­‐facing.    

    “Even  if  the  project  is  completed,  IT  departments  often  find  it  challenging  to  devote  the  proper  resources   needed  to  manage  users,  make  changes,  and  deploy  updates,”  says  James  Quigley,  CEO  and  cofounder  of   Canvas.  “An  organization  might  have  to  start  from  scratch  every  six  months  to  keep  up  with  ever-­‐evolving   needs,  platforms,  and  mobile  devices.”     That  has  led  to  so-­‐called  “shadow  IT”  technology  solutions  that  the  IT  department  may  not  even  be  aware   of.  Employees  can  use  cloudbased  software  and  services  to  create  their  own  mobile  solutions  without  any   coding,  which  can  be  both  a  blessing  and  a  curse  for  IT.  “One  could  argue  that  shadow  IT  must  be  front   and  center  in  an  enterprise’s  mobile  strategy  today  in  order  to  transform  it  from  a  potential  negative  that   the  IT  department  struggles  to  retain  control  of,  to  a  positive  that  empowers  non-­‐IT  specialists  to   accelerate  innovation  and  efficiency  within  organizations,”  Quigley  says.     Mobile  Strategy  Must-­‐Haves   Unlike  other  initiatives,  mobility  is  much  easier  to  understand  for  employees  affected  by  the  deployment.   In  many  cases,  end  users  have  as  much  or  more  knowledge  about  the  technology  and  applications  than   their  internal  support  teams.  These  solutions  may  also  encompass  nonemployees  such  as  suppliers,   contractors,  or  even  customers.  End  users  have  a  larger  role  to  play  in  the  mobility  strategy  than  ever   before.     “Even  BYOD  users  are  beginning  to  reject  MDM  from  being  installed  on  their  phones.”   Brian  Day,  Apperian     “Because  everyone  has  an  interest  in  mobile  technology,  mobile  is  actually  forcing  companies  to  become   more  aware  of  their  operations,  processes,  and,  more  importantly,  their  customers,”  Nielsen  says.  “A   modern  mobile  enterprise  will  have  cross-­‐functional  teams  driving  mobile  innovation  —  with  customers   at  the  core  of  everything  they  do.  Providing  a  flexible  framework  to  continue  to  adapt,  adopt,  and  change   will  give  companies  the  freedom  to  grow  and  transform  their  business.”     Mobility  is  no  longer  a  fringe  IT  strategy;  it’s  core  to  the  entire  business  and  must  include  line-­‐of-­‐business   leadership.  “Mobile  apps  need  to  be  designed  with  a  perfect  user  experience,  similar  to  consumer  apps,   and  have  an  adoption  strategy,”  Day  says.  “Users  need  to  understand  the  need  for  the  apps,  where  to  find   them,  how  to  install  them  and  get  updates.”     Modern  mobility  must  also  be  ROI-­‐focused.  “Mobility  projects  can  increase  efficiency,  reduce  costs,   improve  employee  engagement,  and  drive  powerful  customer  experiences,”  Quigley  says.  “With  all  this   opportunity  and  the  growing  variety  of  tools  and  software,  organizations  must  remain  focused  on  ROI-­‐ centric  initiatives.”  The  mobility  strategy  should  be  scalable,  cross-­‐platform,  and  be  adaptable  enough  so   that  the  technology  can  grow  with  the  organization.  It’s  important  to  empower  staff  outside  of  IT  to  be   able  to  build  applications,  improve  processes,  and  take  accountability  for  their  own  mobile  solutions.     “The  pace  of  technology  and  business  change  is  unrelenting,  and  enterprises  cannot  afford  to  etch  a   strategy  in  stone  and  then  revisit  it  years  later,”  Quigley  says.  “In  some  cases,  projects  and  technology   that  were  relevant  a  few  months  ago  may  be  rendered  obsolete  by  faster,  cheaper,  more  efficient,  or   more  customizable  technologies.  And  as  this  has  occurred,  competitors  can  move  even  faster  than  before.   Organizations  must  have  flexible  strategies  around  mobile  and  must  constantly  be  disrupting  themselves   in  order  to  avoid  being  disrupted  by  a  competitor  or  other  technology  or  market  forces.”     Security  is  a  key  consideration  and  should  be  addressed  early  in  the  development  of  a  mobility  strategy.   That  includes  app-­‐level  security  as  well  as  device  security.  Any  solution  should  be  evaluated  based  on  app-­‐ level  coding,  third-­‐party  modules,  log-­‐in  processes,  data  encryption,  data  transfer  methods,  and  potential   defenses  against  hacks.     “Relying  on  device-­‐level  security,  such  as  requiring  device  PINs  or  having  the  ability  to  remotely  wipe  a   device,  only  helps  if  the  device  is  lost  or  stolen,”  Day  says.  “It  does  not  provide  features  that  offer  real-­‐ time  protection  of  apps  and  data.  These  features  are  even  more  important  for  organizations  employing   extended  workers.  Getting  apps  to  100  percent  of  the  target  audience  is  a  key  piece  of  today’s  strategy.    

      The  need  for  a  system  to  provision  and  deprovision  apps  is  extremely  integral,  as  full  MDM  device  control   is  not  able  to  be  implemented  in  these  settings.”     These  concepts  are  not  necessarily  new.  What  is  new  is  that  companies  are  looking  for  more  “killer  apps”   that  will  create  business  impacts  (as  opposed  to  simply  mobilizing  existing  paperwork)  and  developing  a   strategy  of  building  multiple  apps  and  finding  ways  to  securely  deliver  them.     “The  rapid  innovation  around  mobile  technology  changes  like  the  tide,”  says  Nielsen.  “Whereas  previous   technology  waves  could  be  left  alone  until  the  next  CPU  leapfrog  in  Moore’s  Law  could  be  justified,   modern  strategy  cannot  be  fixed.  Changes  are  no  longer  driven  by  enterprise  IT;  the  actual  use  cases  are   now  being  brought  from  the  outside  in.  Stakeholders  have  expanded  from  internal  resources  to  the  point   where  activity,  service,  and  care  are  taking  place.  Access  to  on-­‐demand  data,  location,  and  real-­‐time  alerts   are  the  use  cases  companies  need  in  order  to  remain  competitive.”     Partners  Provide  Latest  Mobile  Expertise   According  to  the  vendors  interviewed,  stumbling  blocks  in  mobility  projects  often  arise  around   incompatibility  with  MDM  solutions  or  deploying  cloud-­‐based  solutions  that  are  unable  to  communicate   with  other  business  systems.  Companies  may  bite  off  more  than  they  can  chew  if  they  try  to  build  their   own  work  process  applications  from  scratch.   “This  is  usually  not  the  best  use  of  IT,”  Quigley  says.  “Plus  the  time,  costs,  and  resources  needed  to  build,   deploy,  and  maintain  their  own  apps  end  up  being  much  higher  than  organizations  anticipate.  These   companies  end  up  with  something  that  is  not  updated  regularly  and  thus  is  frustrating  to  employees,  not   compatible  with  newer  mobile  platforms  and  devices,  not  featurerich,  not  secure,  and  not  driving  the  ROI   that  it  could  be.”     Companies  sometimes  try  to  do  it  all  themselves  in  order  to  maintain  control  of  the  mobile  environment,   but  are  quickly  swamped  by  the  unexpected  complexities.  “Mobile  solutions  change  often,  so  just   managing  the  hardware,  OS,  MDM,  and  application  upgrades  becomes  a  full-­‐time  job,”  says  Nielsen.   “Before  they  know  it,  the  IT  expert  they  just  hired  to  support  the  mobile  environment  has  left  for  another   job.  Companies  need  to  decide  whether  they  want  to  be  in  the  mobile  support  business  or  the  business  of   driving  new  growth  opportunities.”     According  to  Day,  companies  should  also  separate  their  mobile  strategies  into  requirements  for  hardware   and  software.  “Don’t  let  a  solution  for  one  dictate  the  strategy  for  the  other,”  Day  says.  “An  MDM   solution  is  superb  at  managing  corporate-­‐  issued  mobile  devices,  while  a  modern  mobile  app   management  solution  that  is  not  built  with  a  legacy  MDM  framework  will  provide  the  most  flexible  and   scalable  way  to  secure,  deploy,  and  monitor  mobile  apps  for  all  users.  This  can  be  done  regardless  of   whether  or  not  their  devices  are  enrolled  in  MDM,  allowing  for  a  ‘system  of  record’  of  mobile  apps  across   an  organization.”     Finally,  the  biggest  mistake  service  companies  can  make  is  delaying  a  mobile  deployment  because  they   are  waiting  for  a  “perfect”  solution  that  provides  specific  features.  “There  are  too  many  opportunities  to   leverage  mobile  technology,  and  the  technology  changes  too  quickly  to  perfectly  time  your  investment,”   says  Nielsen.  “Create  a  cross-­‐functional  team,  and  then  partner  with  a  mobile  specialist  (not  a  generalist)   who  can  help  you  create  a  plan  to  deliver,  execute,  monitor  results,  and  ensure  your  mobile  environment   is  always  on  and  always  available.”