BYOD: Business Opportunity or Big Headache?

Management Information Systems

Chapter 5

PG. 217

INFS 401

Rob Holzheimer
 1. What are the advantages and disadvantages of allowing employees to use their personal
smartphones for work?

The advantage of allowing employees to use their personal smartphone for work allows for employers
to spend less money on technology equipment. They are also so common that nowadays everybody
expects you to have a smartphone. If your job takes place a lot outside the office, people will expect to
have another number to contact you. I do believe the biggest advantage of having a mobile phone is
that it becomes much easier to contact you. It doesn´t matter if you are on your way to work stuck in
traffic, or if you are away from the office, or if you just left for a business trip, your customers, co-
workers, managers and directors will always be able to contact you anytime. A smartphone gives you
more time to communicate where an important conversation can take place anywhere and at any time
of the day you are available or depending on the time zone. The use of personal smartphones for work
will allow a whole network of employees or offices to communicate with each other no matter where
they are. It allows you to check details quickly and to confirm your appointments such as the use of
Google Calendar where you set your own appointments, meetings and other important dates ahead of
time. You can communicate with an employee or with the person you expect to meet at any time to
confirm through Google Calendar or a reminder to get that information you might forget before that
important meeting. Effective use of smartphones can help improve both employer to employee, and
employee to employee communications.

The disadvantages of allowing employees to their personal smart phone for work is the absence of an
effective way to keep track of all the devices employees are using if they constantly change their
numbers or buy a new smartphone without the employer’s acknowledgment. Another disadvantage of
being accessible through using a smartphone anywhere and at any time is that you might get calls
outside of business hours or in case of emergencies at work. There might be some instances that if a
customer sees your number as the only source of contact while away from the office. I my perspective
the biggest fear many employers have over using a smartphone for business is that the cost will be so
high as to damage their business, because there is a risk that some employees could misuse the phone,
raising bills extremely. Some business charges their employees for the non-business calls, so they make
sure bills charges are kept as low as possible.

2. What people, organization, and technology factors should be addressed when deciding whether
to allow employees to use their personal smartphones for work?

Some companies who have policies and procedures in place, and have implemented on how personal
smartphones are to be used or not to be used during working hours. A person with personal
smartphones plays a big factor in a business to how it is used for work use. The factors that the person
working with that organization and technology should be addressed to include how the devices will be
used to perform operational duties only while at work. For example, time management and productivity
needs to be addressed accordingly. Another is to have the company be able to keep track of all devices
their employees are using. They need to have efficient inventory management system that keeps track
of all devices their employees are using, where it is located, whether is it being used, and what type of
software it is equipped with such as a customized personal technical support. They need to ensure that
any sensitive or confidential information isn’t freely available to anyone that is not within the
organization.
 3. Compare the BYOD experiences of Michelin North America and Rosendin Electric. Why did BYOD
at Michelin work so well?

Michelin North America all 4000 mobile devices the company used were company-owned and obsolete,
with a large number of traditional cell phones is used only for voice transmission and messaging. For
Rosendin Electric, they have thousands of employees and deployed hundreds of smartphones, more
than 400 iPads, and a few Microsoft Surface tablets, that would be careless in handling those devices.

BYOD at Michelin worked so well because it was able to implement its own version of BYOD which
increased the number of mobile-enabled employees to 7000. The program is cost-neutral. They opted
for a managed service from Cass Information Systems that enables the company to make payments
directly to wireless carriers. A single employee portal handles enrollment of corporate and BYOD devices
and provides tracking and reporting for all ongoing mobile and related inventory and expenses. The
portal can automatically register employees, verify user eligibility, ensure policy acknowledgement, and
distribute credits directly to employees’ wireless accounts for the service they used for their jobs. This
means their employee efficiency, productivity, and satisfaction have improved from form updating the
mobile technology and functionality available to employees and giving them choices in mobile devices
and wireless carrier plans. The company has obtained new vendor discounts across all wireless vendors
in the U.S. and Canada, and has reduced the cost of deploying each mobile device by more than 30
percent.

4. Allowing employees use their smartphones for work will save the company money. Do you agree?
Why or why not?

I agree to only some extent. I think it depends how big the company is and what the ration of money is
saved from not having to buy smartphones for their employees to their overall expenses. If the losses
are greater than the cost of smartphones, it is not worth it. Losses could include decreases in
productivity, inefficient sharing of company-specific cloud software, lack of personal technical support
which can result in decreases in productivity and frustration. On the other hand, if the losses are
insignificant and the company operates on a low budget I think that personal smartphones can greatly
increase the profitability of a company if given the opportunity to use them at work.