Caught in the Balancing Act!

As CIOs and IT heads continue to tread the enterprise mobility path cautiously, will organizations open up and embrace liberal policies anytime soon?

IT organizations are constantly catching up with the changing enterprise dynamics. Of the many battles CIOs are fighting today, enterprise mobility could be one of the toughest as it presents a challenge on both fronts—within the enterprise and outside. Inside the organization, if the new-age, tech-savvy workforce is there to keep you on your toes, outside you have the uncompromising and well-connected customer asking for attention where ever he goes. The big question is how to keep the employees and customers happy in an increasingly ‘mobile’ environment?

Enterprise mobility has arrived anyway and is here to give IT departments their share of sleepless nights. As smartphone penetration continues to rise and people have access to all sorts of devices, it is no longer a choice. Himanshu Shah, Chief Technology Officer, Adarsh Credit points out, “Enterprise mobility is a critical business requirement.” Organizations that fear mobility and continue to shy away from it are at risk of facing employee dissatisfaction and losing out on customers. “Winning the future will require companies across industries to embrace mobility platforms that unlock productivity and competitive advantage,” Shah adds.

It’s a complete transition that is engulfing the enterprise. Customers are seeking seamless experience on all touch points and any delays could result in serious damages to the business. Employees are demanding support to work from multiple devices and from different places. And if we go by the numbers this is only going to get bigger.

According to a study by Zinnov management consulting, enterprise mobility will take a large share of transformational IT focus of Indian enterprises. The Enterprise mobility market is expected to increase almost five folds, touching $1 bn by mid-2015, up from $244 mn in 2011. An increasing number of CIOs have mobility in their list of strategic initiatives. Many are seriously thinking about it but still far away from making real moves. The EY Big Data & Enterprise Mobility report states that around 60% of organizations are still in the process of making existing IT assets mobile-enabled and 30% of organizations are using mobility to refine existing business models and drive incremental revenue streams.

Some experts argue that mobility is not a new thing. Its arrival dates back to the 1980’s when enterprise-wide telephonic networks emerged. The improvements in security and technology platforms have brought in application level enterprise mobility, which is a fairly recent phenomenon. The reasons why organizations are embracing mobility could be many. The increasing need for responsiveness, higher productivity and overall satisfaction for external and internal stakeholders are some of key reasons. Shah adds, “Enterprises that harness mobility can create entirely new ways of delivering products and services—and overall business value inside the four walls and with business partners and customers.”

Explosion in smartphones and tablets and subsequent growth in BYOD are driving mobility adoption across sectors. According to the PWC report, Enterprise Mobility—Putting People First, India ranks fifth among the top countries for smartphone users, with an estimated 67 mn subscribers in 2013. And this continues to grow at an alarming rate.
Many small and medium organizations are also opening up to BYOD as it allows them to cut down on the hardware costs and allocate IT budgets on the software side. Another factor that is pushing the movement is organizations’ pressing need to enable productivity by encouraging employees to use the devices of their choice. The concept of single office and place of work no longer exists. Hence, there is the need to mobilize applications and provide employees access to enterprise systems anytime anywhere. “People demand the freedom to work on the device of their choice. This consumerization is well established in the enterprise and will drive continued transformation of business and IT models in the coming years. By embracing this trend and adopting a BYOD strategy, organizations can empower people while protecting data and simplifying IT,” says, Jayakrishnan P, Associate Vice President, Muthoot Pappachan Technologies.

Sales & marketing and customer service are the areas where there is higher push for mobility. It’s been reported that with mobility solutions these teams have been able to respond faster and their productivity has seen significant improvements. According to Zinnov, Indian companies are now looking at enterprise mobility for functions like ERP, CRM, SCM, sales force automation, unified communication and billing, moving beyond traditional email and social networking.

Enterprise mobility choices could differ across organizations. Some are opting for endorsed platforms, while some are looking at commercial off the shelf applications like Dropbox. Enterprises with unique requirements are also going for custom built enterprise mobility applications. Experts point out that most Indian enterprises are looking for point solutions are yet to follow a structured approach.

What’s the Attitude?

Although most enterprise CIOs are toying with the idea of developing mobility capabilities, some continue to be protectionist, some are little balanced, while some also seem to be going liberal in their mobility approach. Considering that security remains a cause of worry, some are treading the path safely. Commenting on his company’s mobility policy, Jayakrishnan, says that it follows a protectionist attitude. “Data is the most important asset of our business,” he states the reason. Ramnath Iyer, CTO, Crisil, also shares a similar view and continues to tread the path cautiously. “We have a protectionist attitude to mobility in our organization because of the kind of business we are in. We deal in a lot of client confidential and market information data. So we provide corporate mails using an MDM solution, lock down BlackBerry devices and in certain areas prevent employees from carrying their mobile phones altogether,” he says.

Some CIOs also seem to be moving on to having a balanced approach. Shah is one of them. “A mobility strategy is an absolute essential for any enterprise to put up a balancing act between multiple devices, ownership models, applications and operating systems, satisfying end user and corporate needs. We need higher adoption to get real benefit and at the same time we need to protect our enterprise information,” he says.

Anthony Thomas, Chief Information Officer, Vodafone India, expresses a fairly liberal view. “We encourage a liberal policy. We are in the process of implementing BYOD policies, at large, to encourage mobility in a big way,” Thomas says. He adds that although the company has protected its mobile device and other remote accesses adequately, it still fears the threat of cyber criminals as well as user behavior creating security issues.
So is it too early to see open policies finding place across organizations? It is argued that as the fear of losing out employees and customers in being averse to mobility is quite big, it is likely that enterprises will sooner or later move to more open mobility policies.

What about Security?

No matter how significant the benefits of mobility tend to be, the security factor is too big to be overlooked. Hence enterprises are making cautious moves towards mobility. “CIOs in Indian organizations are making gradual and low-risk investments in mobility,” says Milan Sheth, Partner & Technology Sector leader, EY. He adds that even firms that have invested a bulk in mobility in the past are now slowing down the pace of investments to understand the space better and target specific services crucial to their business.

“There are multiple operating systems and the security levels vary across these systems. Malwares, Trojans and other compromises can be almost taken for granted in the mobility space,” says, Iyer. Also there is an internal threat that looms large. “Mobile devices can be casually used to scan/photograph documents, record confidential meetings, save sensitive documents, etc. Continuing the same levels of data security is an internal challenge,” he adds.

Despite the improvements in security solutions, securing mobile applications remains a major concern for CIOs. Commenting on CIOs’ response to mobility adoption, Sanjay Gupta, Vice President, Future Middleware Business, Oracle India, says, “The challenge revolves around how to ensure data privacy authorized use of corporate applications and authorized storage of corporate data on a personal device.”

Data security is the biggest cause of worry. The threat is relatively huge in sectors like BFSI and client facing organizations. Device management and support is another challenge CIOs are facing in implementing mobility. Sheth adds, “The variety of devices and mobile service providers in the market are making it difficult to have a unified device and application management service across the firm.”

What Lies Ahead?

Industry experts suggest that currently there is a stronger movement on the supply side. The vendor landscape continues to evolve as service providers ramp up their mobile capabilities like dedicated mobile design teams and testing labs. Some service providers are also helping clients with business offerings like mobile strategy and enterprise mobility roadmaps, process improvement and so on.

Enterprises are still making slow and steady steps. CIOs are getting caught in the balancing act of supporting business needs and ensuring security. Where to draw the line is the tough question. But adoption is likely to speed up in the near future as organizations are gearing up with their plans. Ashok Cherian, CIO, JK Cement adds, “We have now overcome the initial challenges like user acceptability and adoption with the strong leadership endorsement as well as seamless delivery. For us, we wish to go beyond the normal mobility proven business processes and find innovative and nimble process breakthroughs leveraging mobility.”

The need is to understand the business requirements and the role of mobility in the wider scheme of things. The strategy should hence align well with the overall business goals. When taking up mobility first time, CIOs should be able to identify the biggest area of impact and use this to demonstrate business value. Collaboration between IT and business teams will be the key to success. “Speaking from a mobility enabler perspective, the value of the solutions will be enhanced several times if IT and business collaborate effectively,” says Ashish Pachory, CIO, Tata Teleservices.

It’s tough to draw the line and strike a fair balance between enabling mobility led transformations and ensuring that the security essentials remain intact. But the choice is whether to fear it or face it. You just can’t ignore it.