Expert Advice on the Pros and Cons of Developing a BYOD Policy – Commentary by Paul Hill
December 4, 2013 — Mobile Fever
As BYOD becomes more acceptable in the workplace, the concerns of IT leaders continue to grow. We interviewed 22 mobility and BYOD experts to provide some pros and cons around implementing and developing an Enterprise Mobility BYOD strategy. (Click here to see comments from other 21 consultants – http://bit.ly/18lWT7y)
Paul B. Hill, Senior Consultant, SystemsExperts
Paul B. Hill is a Senior Consultant at SystemsExperts, assisting on a wide range of challenging projects across a variety of industries including higher education, legal, and financial services with the company for more than twelve years. He joined SystemExperts full time in March 2012 and coordinates the SMARTday practice.
Some of the pros of a BYOD policy for the enterprise include:
– Perceived cost savings resulting by shifting the acquisition cost of smartphones and tablets to employees
– An attempt to foster employee morale by granting employees the ability to adopt new platforms of their own choosing
– Eliminating a potential tax reporting burden if the IRS decides that company provided smartphones and tablets are taxable benefits
– Potential time savings by avoiding corporate dialing and data plans with carriers
Some of the cons facing companies when they adopt a BYOD policy include:
– Higher support costs: support staff may need to be trained to answer questions about a wider variety of platforms; multiple answers to address a single issue may need to be established, and some support staff specialization may occur
– Increased security risks: not all mobile platforms support all security features
– Handling of corporate: understanding where corporate data may reside, ensuring compliance with data retention policies, eDiscovery, and ensuring that all corporate data is being properly handled
– Balancing corporate requirements/liabilities: organizations are not yet requiring employees to sign liability waivers to protect companies that may accidentally destroy personal data if a device has to be remotely wiped.
Despite the risks, the desire to achieve cost savings and improve employee morale will continue to drive BYOD for the foreseeable future.
Founded in 1994, SystemExperts is a premier boutique provider of IT compliance and cyber security consulting services. We help clients see the big picture and design solutions to meet their comprehensive security needs. We are dedicated to providing unmatched personal attention, distilling problems to their root causes and recommending what’s appropriate for our clients. We have built our reputation on providing practical, effective IT security solutions for securing enterprise computing infrastructures.
