Enterprise mobility is about more than just equipping your employees with smartphones and tablets so they can work on the go.
For your business to be truly mobile you need a strategy and solution that will:
- Maximise the many benefits of mobility;
- Help you get ahead of the competition; and
- Make life easier for everyone in your organisation.
But it’s no easy task to manage a growing mobile technology eco-system – it takes time, resources and know-how. If any of these elements are missing, your workforce productivity will fall flat. So how do you maximise the benefits of mobility and avoid the pitfalls?
Here, we discuss three reasons why an organisation’s enterprise mobility initiatives fail – and share our tips and advice on how to avoid them.
Underestimating Your Enterprise Mobility Needs
When putting together your mobility strategy, make sure you assess your organisation’s needs completely and accurately. A common mistake is not engaging stakeholders from every possible user group during planning to identify the features that will be most useful to each of them. At a minimum, seek feedback from your IT team, HR department, Sales and Marketing, company executives, and end users. It’s worth it.
Putting some extra effort in during planning will give you a much clearer picture of your mobility priorities. For example:
Business priorities
- Compliance
- Data loss prevention
- Workforce productivity
- Privacy standards
IT department priorities
- Enterprise-grade
- Flexibility
End user priorities
- Device choice
- BYOD compatibility
- Easy to use apps
- Reliable wireless access to company applications from anywhere.
An Enterprise Mobility Strategy That Misses the Mark
As you can see, mobility priorities vary from department to department - so be sure to gather plenty of feedback and include your team’s requests in your planning. A one-size-fits-all mobility solution is never the best option – a mobility management plan that is customised for the specific user groups (personas) within your organisation is a much more effective approach. It may take longer to get up and running, but you’ll save yourself a lot of headaches down the track.
When you incorporate your team’s suggestions into your mobility strategy, you’ll see an increase in productivity and efficiency, which is a win for your customers and for your business. In fact, Microsoft estimated that when mobility is executed correctly, remote workers can produce up to 240 extra hours of work per year. That’s six weeks of additional productivity.
On the other hand, if your mobility strategy is rushed, and has been put together without input from your team, you’re likely to invest a lot of time, effort and money into something that has little impact on the way you do business.
Not Getting the Help You Need
Enterprise mobility is growing at a rapid rate, and if your mobile technology eco-system is too, your IT department is likely feeling the strain.
Enterprise mobility has plenty of upsides, but it requires a significant time investment to manage it well. This calls for either diverting resources from other areas of your business, or opting to use a managed mobility service provider (MMSP) to execute an enterprise mobility management (EMM) solution.
Tailored EMM solutions, should cover design, deployment, ongoing management and security. Starting with a thorough review of your mobility requirements, your MMSP then tailors a solution that incorporates the features you need to achieve your mobility goals.
You'll then be able to get everyone in your business connected, then deploy, integrate and manage your content and apps. Done well, an EMM solution will ensure that all devices in your technology eco-system are compliant, have secure access and are protected from cyberattacks.
Enterprise Mobility Management Now A Standard Business Requirement
Mobility is now an integral part of how we do business – increasing productivity, improving efficiency and opening doors to new ways of communicating and collaborating.
To maximise the benefits that mobility offers, you need a strategy based on a clear understanding of how your organisation will use mobility and a solid system in place to manage your mobile technology eco-system. Because if you don’t have the foundation and support in place, your mobile technology will underachieve as will your workforce productivity.
Over to You
Are you struggling to create, implement or manage your business mobility strategy? Please get in touch, we are seasoned professional and can guide you with expert know-how.
