Apr 16, 2015

In the current day and age, it’s no surprise that most adults take their smartphone, well, everywhere. Today’s mobile devices come fully loaded and are capable of performing more tasks than ever before. As such, it only makes sense that these mobile endpoints make their way into corporate settings through BYOD management programs.

However, our obsession with the mobile platform may be more far reaching than many would have expected. As users continue to leverage their smartphones, tablets and laptops for an ever-increasing amount of activities, company leaders can utilize this trend to the advantage of their workforce and their business.

A day without a smartphone: Recent study findings
According to a recent Bank of America survey, most consumers place a surprising level of importance on their smartphones, Forbes stated. In fact, 91 percent of respondents noted that their mobile phone is just as critical to their life as their car, and even their deodorant. You heard correctly – for the majority of consumers, the smartphone use is equally as essential as their personal hygiene.

Some even recognized that their smartphones were even more important than other necessities – 60 percent valued their mobile phone over coffee, and 76 percent said the same was true of their television.

Thanks to these results, Bank of America surmised that nearly half of all Americans – 47 percent – couldn’t survive a single day without their smartphones. They may be able to live without coffee or deodorant, but not without the handheld hardware that basically makes their world go ’round.

What does this mean for BYOD?
So what does this trend mean for the use of mobile devices in the office? Simply put, those that don’t allow their employees to leverage their own smartphones in an enterprise setting are taking away something that these workers view as a life essential. According to the study findings, these individuals would care less if the office no longer supplied coffee.

In this way, companies can utilize users’ obsession with their mobile devices to their advantage by supporting these activities through a BYOD management initiative. Many are already realizing this, as evident by the fact that Gartner predicts that within the next three years, half of all workplaces won’t just encourage BYOD, they’ll require it, stated Computer World. In fact, by 2016, nearly 40 percent of organizations plan to stop providing mobile devices to their workforces and instead allow their employees to utilize their own smartphones.

In most cases, going the no-BYOD route can cause more headaches than it’s worth. Gartner analyst David Willis noted that when businesses buy devices for their employees, a number of issues can arise.

“What happens if you buy a device for an employee and the leave the job a month later?” Willis asks. “How are you going to settle up? Better to keep it simple.”

A BYOD management plan is not only a m