Bring your personal device to work policies prove well-liked by large enterprises

Enterprises your personal the bring your individual device (BYOD) to work trend.

According to a survey of businesses with greater than 2,000 employees, 80 per cent are supporting the BYOD model, while 60 per cent of these with greater than 5,000 employees support it; 35 per cent of companies with at the least 10,000 employees accomplish that.

The research, by mobile device management vendor Good Technology, also found that enormous companies from the finance/insurance and healthcare industries dominate the whole BYOD picture, while retail/wholesale companies and government are less prone to support it.

When asked whether current policies had to be adjusted for BYOD, 77 per cent of respondents said that they had modified their policies, while 23 per cent said they were in a position to accommodate BYOD without making changes.   

The survey also found that employees are willing to pay for private devices used at work, with 50 per cent of businesses with BYOD models requiring employees to hide all costs. Just below half (45 per cent) of companies provide their employees with a stipend or ‘expense back' options to assist subsidise the price of their mobile device or service plan.

Those companies that supply stipends have the very best rate of employees using mobile devices.

The report said: “The influx of non-public mobile devices within the enterprise is changing policy drastically. This report's findings support the concept formal BYOD programmes, combined with supporting solutions and policies to confirm security and compliance, are fast becoming the predominant model for enabling broad employee mobility, across multiple industries and around the world.

“In fact, across all industries surveyed, the enormous majority of Good's customers have already got such programmes and supporting solution and policies in place. But, whatever their specific objectives and approach might be, it's clear that enterprises must take a proactive approach in the event that they are to compete effectively with their peer companies, maximise the productivity in their employees and make sure ongoing security and compliance in an increasingly mobile and BYOD world.  

William Beer, director at PwC, said: “Almost every client I engage with is scuffling with the BYOD question; a few of them are doing it strategically, so that they are actively saying ‘we will enable BYOD on our networks to save lots of money', or ‘we will use this to attract talent to the firm', while others are struggling simply because the senior executives are saying ‘I want my iPad connected to the network' or ‘I know our competitors can use the iPad on their network'.

"BYOD as a term is so broad. To my mind it's about technology and, primarily, email; but then it truly is in regards to the application, and folk aren't giving enough specialise in the appliance.

“I would break it down into four things: the technology, the mail, the applications and, crucial, the governance. So are you updating your security awareness programme?”