By Josh Peterson, Owner, Axontech and President SMBTN, and Dave Seibert, CIO, IT Innovators and VP, SMBTN.
It’s true while the proliferation of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD)laptops, smartphones and tablets has surged in the last 12 months within our industry to make things more streamlined for SMBs, it has, at the same time, caused headaches for partners. With a variety of different devices available, it’s hard to keep up on all of the different operating systems and programs. Of course, the end users still scream the usual: “Just make it work!” If you haven’t encountered these requests yet, chances are high that you will shortly. In fact, according to Good Technology’s 2nd Annual State of BYOD Report, 75.5% of companies are currently supporting BYOD, 13.3% will in the next 12 months, 6.1% will at some time in the future, and only 5% have no plans to support BYOD.
Weighing the BYOD Benefits
There are business benefits to embracing the BYOD trend, of course. Some companies have shifted IT expenses to the employees. As an example, they will not be obligated to provide a device if an employee wants to use their own, or, will provide a $500 subsidy for a laptop that may be less than what they’d normally spend purchasing a full laptop. In many cases, employees that are embracing the BYOD trend are spending much more money out of pocket on high-end Alienware and Mac Pro laptops, for example.
As many of you know, we both like to network. As such, we’ve discussed this with other partners in roundtable settings and came up with the following tips that we’d like to share:
1. Start off by having a discussion with upper management about the potential impact of BYOD units for the business. Let them know that control of these devices will be more difficult than a company-provided PC and that proprietary data may be lost if someone loses a BYOD device. Determine whether the company or the employee will pay for supporting the device and alter your contract accordingly.
2. Consider regulatory demands, such as GLBA, HIPAA, and SOX. Even PCI-DSS may apply if an employee decides to use the device to run a credit card transaction. These may require additional controls or make BYOD impractical for the particular company that has to abide by these regulations.
3. Work with your client to craft an Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) that their employees sign. In particular, stress the fact that the device can and will be wiped in the event of loss or intrusion. This can stop many employees from adopting this model, as the last thing they want to see is their family pictures deleted. Beyond that, consider enforcing minimum security requirements, such as complex passwords and approved security software.
4. Decide which devices to support, if not all. With Exchange ActiveSync, for example, it can be easy to work with and wipe e-mails from many types of devices. The BlackBerry Enterprise Server can offer greater security control, but can also require additional resources and configuration.
5. Bandwidth can become a problem for the environment. As employees bring their own units in, they often feel that they can do as they wish with their own device and turn on the tap for streaming high bandwidth Web sites such as Pandora and YouTube. A next-generation firewall with application control may be required to both monitor and limit (or curtail access to) these sites.
6. In highly secure environments, consider having the business purchase the units, rather than relying on BYOD. Programs such as Apple Configurator can be used to control just about any aspect of an iPad, for example, allowing the small business greater control.
7. Also consider purchasing Mi-Fi or similar 3G/4G devices and insisting that the employees use those to connect to the Internet, rather than using randomly named “airport wireless” connections that could be compromised.
8. Rather than keep any proprietary data on the device themselves, a Remote Desktop, Citrix server, or VDI solution can be set up to provide an entire desktop to just about any device. This allows the employee to use their own device but still be productive, while you can maintain complete control over the data.
In summary, it’s clear that the BYOD trend is one that is going to continue. With proper planning and client engagement, it’s possible to not only provide great solutions for your clients around the trend, but to add additional revenue by doing so.
Josh Freifield is Owner of AxonTech a Los Angeles-area computer and consulting firm servicing SMB, government, and education clients. He also serves as President of SMBTN, an industry organization of consultants, solutions providers, and VARs who provide technology products and services small-tomedium sized enterprises.
Dave Seibert is the Vice President of SMB Technology Network (SMBTN), a US-wide partner network with over 500 members. Seibert is also the CIO for IT Innovators, a Microsoft Gold Partner serving Southern California.
