As mobile applications are altering the way businesses interact with employees, partners and customers, building an active and effective mobile app strategy has become imperative.
This is according to Craig Terblanche, director at OutSystems SA, who notes by investing in a mobile strategy, employees are given the tools needed to make better and faster decisions.
There are long-term financial implications to picking the right app development strategy, says OutSystems.
While innovating to gain a competitive-edge is more critical than ever, it's also clear businesses need a financially viable and sustainable strategy to develop and maintain mobile apps.
Terblanche points out mobility makes "moment-in-time" decision-making possible - current information is available and accessible to the mobile devices of employees and customers.
In SA, most organisations have only adopted a fragmented approach and deployed an app on either Android or iOS with one or two code bases, says Terblanche.
According to a Forrester Research report, businesses should assess an inventory of existing mobile development skills, time-to-market constraints, enterprise infrastructure changes, and how all of these factors will coexist in an overall mobile strategy.
Therefore, developing a comprehensive mobility strategy requires software developers to collaborate with executives and business decision-makers across the organisation and also communicate the need for a comprehensive mobile strategy to all critical stakeholders, Forrester adds.
Companies should put in place a bimodal mobile app strategy that accommodates agility without compromising governance, says Terblanche. Also, the bimodal strategy should inform other development decisions, such as tooling and integration.
According to Richard Broeke, national sales manager at Sericom, an IT security vendor, having a mobile strategy is not enough - companies need an integrated mobile strategy that aligns with the overall business growth endeavours.
It should also offer a holistic, centralised view of the mobile device ecosystem, and a complete set of tools aligned with the organisation's requirements and mobile strategy.
Organisations need to implement a sound mobile device security policy, which stipulates the requirements for securing mobile devices, including company-owned and employees' personal smartphones and tablets used for work purposes, Broeke adds.
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