Organisations that fail to set clear mobility strategies are in danger of losing out to the competition, and failing to embrace enterprise mobility will have negative results.
So said George Kalebaila, senior research manager for telecommunications and digital media at IDC, presenting at the IDC Enterprise Mobility Forum 2014 in Sandton yesterday.
Kalebaila said the International Data Corporation (IDC) conducted a survey of 60 CIOs and IT managers in SA to find out what their technology priority was for 2014, and enterprise mobility was top of the agenda.
"In SA, organisations are beginning to take enterprise mobility very seriously because if they don't, someone else will define that agenda for them," said Kalebaila.
He believes mobility should be at the forefront of business leaders when designing business strategies.
Organisations need to develop a framework that enables mobility and define mobile strategies to outline their goals and ambitions, said Kalebaila.
He believes the complexities in the enterprise mobility ecosystems are overwhelming as enterprise mobility requires interoperability of systems with multiple interfaces and stakeholders, which is why a company needs a well-thought-out strategy.
Last year, most South African businesses were taking a minimalist view to mobility, said Kalebaila, explaining they were adopting mobility as a way of extending e-mail applications to phones and virtual private networks to employees.
But this year they have discovered mobility should be an integrated approach ? a business solution that cuts across all areas of the organisation functions.
The mobile workforce is going to force enterprises to externalise some of their business processes to get the real benefits of mobility, said Kalebaila.
According to the IDC, a mobile workforce is any employee that spends 20% of their time away from their workspace.
However, mobility comes with its challenges, said Kalebaila, adding that security is top of the list.
It is difficult for CIOs to manage all the different types of devices that the workforce brings to an organisation, said Kalebaila.
He advised that enterprises should evaluate and assess service providers that can help them in the management of mobile infrastructure and applications.
"The convergence of IT and telecommunications enabled by mobility is empowering businesses to virtualise their processes, and thereby increase productivity, stimulate employee performance, streamline business functions, and improve customer service," said Kalebaila.
"It is clear an era of pervasive mobility is imminent, and those enterprises that have adopted a 'mobile-first' mind-set are already pulling ahead of the pack," he concluded.
Share