More and more businesses across Australia are realising the importance of mobility and its benefits, from increased employee productivity to faster responsiveness to customers and colleagues.
Mobility offers modern businesses a wealth of opportunities, and many organisations have already integrated mobility strategies into their operations.
As a result, policies and practices to enable employees to access corporate data on tablets and smartphones are maturing in order to reduce security and data-leakage risks. IT departments and business departments can offer an alternative to problematic ‘bring your own device’ (BYOD) policies with the ‘choose your own device’ (CYOD) model.
A recent Gartner survey showed that a quarter of business users admitted to having a security issue with their personal devices in 2013, but only 27 per cent of those had reported it to their employer.
Under the CYOD approach, the IT team gains the ability to review, test and certify mobile devices for use by employees of the organisation as a whole. By eliminating employees’ ability to bring devices and services from non-approved suppliers (such as consumer retail providers) to work, CYOD minimises the management and security problems that BYOD policies can bring.
Under CYOD, organisations determine what criteria to apply to mobile-device selection while minimising constraints on employees’ freedom of choice. This effectively requires IT to include lightweight, multi-mode devices with high-definition screens on the list of approved hardware.
In addition, organisations need to extend CYOD rules from the device to suppliers’ services and ultimately to the suppliers themselves.
Under best-practice CYOD criteria, suppliers should have a proven track record in providing hardware and services to businesses of any size. They should also be able to deliver:
- Strong and documented processes for imaging, deployment, security, support and disposal.
- A comprehensive security solution that protects corporate data and end-user data residing on a device.
- Fast deployment of enterprise-grade tablets and notebooks that have the same features as consumer devices.
- Knowledgeable and responsive technical support.
- Easy migration to new devices for end users.
- Assurances that security software and management tools are in place before devices are delivered, to protect personal and corporate data.
- Responsive services for remote locations and remote offices.
- Scalable services and services that can be customised to an organisation’s specific requirements.
- Engagement of a reputable supplier with the ability to provide these services, allowing the IT department to better protect and manage technology in the broader organisation.
Lenovo: An ideal CYOD supplier
Lenovo offers a CYOD service that ensures fully functional security tools are installed before devices are delivered, improving IT’s ability to support and provide CYOD devices to remote offices and users. Lenovo Advanced Deployment Services allows these users to perform self-service migrations to devices such as the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, ThinkPad Helix or ThinkPad 10. An old tablet or notebook can be migrated to a new Lenovo device such as a ThinkPad 10 or ThinkPad Helix in 20 minutes without the need for a technician. Lenovo’s priority technical support operates 24 hours a day, seven days a week with less than one minute of hold time and rapid access to skilled technicians. Lenovo also provides support for multiple physical devices with one software image, which lowers management costs and improves technical support for end users.
CYOD represents a great opportunity for businesses to realise the benefits of mobility while minimising concerns over security and management. However, selecting the right supplier to provide CYOD devices and services is a crucial step. Lenovo provides a comprehensive suite of services and the tablets, laptops and convertibles to enable Australian teams to be productive and collaborative.
