By now, the majority of enterprises have put in place some form of bring-your-own-device policy. Employees have been somewhat slow to take advantage of BYOD options, with only one-third currently using their own smartphones in the office, but that number is expected to increase to 60 percent in the next five years, according to information from Gartner. As BYOD gains more traction in the enterprise, companies should begin to look at how such policies can change the way they do business in the new year. David Willis, a vice president at Gartner, noted that BYOD can bring flexibility to an organization, but it can also bring a variety of new concerns, so IT decision-makers should be prepared for a shifting mobile landscape.
Enterprise mobility management
One of the major changes happening to enterprise mobility is the integration of information and application management. Traditionally, mobile device management was separated between application and information management. Recently, however, these two categories have converged into a single realm, enterprise mobility management. EMM emerged in 2014, but will continue to flourish throughout 2015. Having all of an organization's enterprise management needs covered under one system will provide multiple benefits for internal IT staff, but will also begin to blur the line between information security and application security, requiring a new, more integrated approach for both.
BYOD as a recruitment tool
Another big shift that businesses will start to experience is the recruitment and retention potential of BYOD. A recent survey conducted by Samsung found that companies have extended BYOD options to 80 percent of support and line-level employees and 94 percent of non-executive managers. Mobility and flexible working options are becoming increasingly important to applicants and organizations that offer comprehensive programs will have a bigger advantage when it comes to persuading the best candidates for the job. With the ability to telecommute, enterprises can recruit the best applicants no matter where they're located.
Bring-your-own-data
Another trend that has just started to emerge is the idea of bring-your-own-data. As enterprise mobile device policies have evolved, a rising number of programs are looking to leverage the personal information of employees to gain insights. According to information from Gartner, nearly one-third of all BYOD policies will utilize employee data, applications and social connections for business purposes by 2016. Workers have become very comfortable with sharing their personal information with companies like Google and Facebook, it was only a matter of time before organizations took advantage of the data sitting right under their noses.