Bring Your Own Device: personal hardware at the workplace
Wade HarshmanScrum Master| GDITIndianapolis, In, United States
What are your experiences with "BYOD" at work?
Are any of you expected to provide your own devices (consulting PMs, for example)? Conversely, are any of you barred from using private devices for security reasons? How does your organization balance security and accessibility?
What advantages and disadvantages have you noticed? Does BYOD give you the time and administrative flexibility you need to manage your projects effectively? Or does it create a toxic "always on" culture that you can't escape? Saving Changes...
A few more pros and cons:
+ In the UK if you are using a phone fror BYOD then in theory you can offset it against your tax bill, in part at least
+ one less device to carry around
- In the UK it is banned in the Financial Services industry by the regulator
- It is difficult to wipe everything from phones, apparently even whatsapp conversations can be restored after a factory reset. This is particularly relevant to those of us who change our phones and sell the old ones, it becomes the biggest risk of BYOD. Saving Changes...
Drew CraigSr. Agile & Product Coach| VanguardPhiladelphia, Pa, United States
In process of rolling out a BYOD device program. Do currently have in place for mobile using MDM, mobile device management, application, thus securing and registering the device. Understand the security issues and concerns, but there are tools to make this a relatively easy process. Certainly, a cost savings for the organization. I have not been in a situation where it was required. Saving Changes...
Yes Marta. Our new strategy is called "digital fitness". To be honest, I was one of the person highly envolved and whose pushed BYOD. As I mentioned BYOD was a new strategy at those time and it was one of our pillars for agility. But when we searched about the impacts mainly related to some locations it was crazy, mainly in the legal domain. For example, who much the organization can be intrusive inside the personal device trying to avoid security issues?. Or, in the other side, how organization will keep sencible information inside devices of level 1 managers secure? So, our "digital fitness" strategy is an hybrid. If you ask me, there is no way to stop people to use they personal devices and it has no sense. But that is my personal opinion. In the corporative/companies world I fully understand there are some topics that must be keep secure. No matter that, as I am living today, people is working in a highly transparent organization.
Thank you Sergio Saving Changes...
Diana E. A. García SánchezDoctorate in Direction of Organizations, Master in Computer Systems and IT| CFECiudad De Mexico, Mexico
You ought to realize that the matter is not top down. Rarely will it matter the policy about it for normal companies. If your own equipment sucks people will bring in their stuff, and if you ban their equipment or make it hard for them to bring it, then productivity will suffer unless you give alternatives.
You banned youtube or socials on your network entirely? they will use their their phones and/or tablets. Your internal mail storage is like yahoo in the 90s with like 10gb capacity and they cant send anything bigger than 2mb in files? well, they will use external mails and the cloud. Working at a distance with no good vpn or its a hassle to even apply to get one? well, the cloud is there as an alternative.
Before thinking on implementing any policy on BYOE think on the alternatives you are giving.
Personally I brought in a gamers keyboard and mouse tot he office to use the nice programmable keys and buttons. I had to register it once (although the ticket is for one month but no one cares) and that's it. However, registering laptops , even monthly is a hassle because you need to waste time upon entering/leaving the building to check serials of equipment, batteries, etc. so you can guess why people eventually give up on it although its a better alternative.
I would say that BYOE is a middle solution. Home work would be better for a lot of stuff that doesnt need to be done on site.
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1 reply by Daire Guiney
Jul 31, 2019 7:20 AM
Daire Guiney
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Its up to the individual to show that the specific piece of IT equipment is only for work related use and not to be used for their own personal use. In some organisation I have seen people justify an expensive piece of IT equipment over another because they liked it and did not want to spend their own money to buy it so they get their organisation to buy it for them . At the end of the day the organisation pays your salary to work using their system and infrastructure to produce results. Its not about who has the latest toy in the office.
Saving Changes...
Wade HarshmanScrum Master| GDITIndianapolis, In, United States
Thank-you all for your replies.
A follow-up question: has anyone here used personal hardware / software / services to enhance your ability to manage projects? (...other than consultants who might be required to show up with their own devices.) Saving Changes...
There was a times when a piece of software that I had been using on my own personal device was more appropriate for the project at hand than the solution the organisation was using. As a result a recommendation was made to view, demonstrate and use the software for a trial period to see what the feedback was like. As a result going forward this software solution was adopted to be use on existing and future projects. Saving Changes...
You ought to realize that the matter is not top down. Rarely will it matter the policy about it for normal companies. If your own equipment sucks people will bring in their stuff, and if you ban their equipment or make it hard for them to bring it, then productivity will suffer unless you give alternatives.
You banned youtube or socials on your network entirely? they will use their their phones and/or tablets. Your internal mail storage is like yahoo in the 90s with like 10gb capacity and they cant send anything bigger than 2mb in files? well, they will use external mails and the cloud. Working at a distance with no good vpn or its a hassle to even apply to get one? well, the cloud is there as an alternative.
Before thinking on implementing any policy on BYOE think on the alternatives you are giving.
Personally I brought in a gamers keyboard and mouse tot he office to use the nice programmable keys and buttons. I had to register it once (although the ticket is for one month but no one cares) and that's it. However, registering laptops , even monthly is a hassle because you need to waste time upon entering/leaving the building to check serials of equipment, batteries, etc. so you can guess why people eventually give up on it although its a better alternative.
I would say that BYOE is a middle solution. Home work would be better for a lot of stuff that doesnt need to be done on site.
Its up to the individual to show that the specific piece of IT equipment is only for work related use and not to be used for their own personal use. In some organisation I have seen people justify an expensive piece of IT equipment over another because they liked it and did not want to spend their own money to buy it so they get their organisation to buy it for them . At the end of the day the organisation pays your salary to work using their system and infrastructure to produce results. Its not about who has the latest toy in the office. Saving Changes...
Stéphane ParentSelf Employed / Semi-retired| Leader MakerPrince Edward Island, Canada
I have two carry two cell phones, my personal one and my work one. But then again, there is no work desk phone either. Saving Changes...
For me the policy works very well in previous workplace I had certainly make full use of it to ‘be in the zone’ due to the set of desks close to me was so toxic (a major restructuring took place then) though I may not necessarily have my music on all the time. I got jobs done this way which what matters to the management.
