There is no doubt that BYOD is the new trend in the industry, but the big question is "Do you really need it?". Dont just implement the policy because other companies are doing it, no matter what anyone says it could be very expensive risk when the things go out of control. So here are the questions that you should ask yourself before implementing this policy in your organization.
Are your employees mature enough to use it wisely?
I have noticed many people even those who are working in an IT organization tend to hand over their devices to unknown people or people who they least know in order to fix the issues. What if unknowingly or knowingly they give these devices to your competitors or hackers? Before implementing BYOD it is always wise to do this check and if you still think that implementing the policy is crucial to your organization make sure that your employees are well trained on these aspects.Conduct few training session and explain them the precautions that they need to take to mitigate the issues.
Who are included in this policy?
It is not wise to include all the users in the organization under this policy, if you are implementing this policy for the first time only include limited people for sometime to analyse the usage, risks and technical challenges involved in it. This helps in making the policy even more secure before applying to everyone. However it is always recommended that you limit this policy to only certain people in the management level as these are the people who stay with the organization for a longer time and are experienced enough to use the policy securely.
Do you have all the resources available to protect the data?
User data is obviously the biggest asset of the organization, before implementing BYOD make sure you have all the tools and technology to safeguard the device and the data. This is because devices under this policy are more harshly used than the usual workstation or the other devices inside the organization. There is nothing that can be done once the data is lost and if you cannot retrieve it back. SMB should take this into consideration because I have seen most of them use opensource application and technologies for their businesses, opensource is great but it has lot of bugs on them, poor updates and no support if something goes wrong. Make sure that you have the correct tools for implementing this policy.
Does the IT team has experience in managing a BYOD environment?
This is the most crucial aspect before implementing the policy, when you go to a war you should make sure that the soldiers are ready for it or else there are many chances that you may loose it. Same applies to any organization, before implementing the policy make sure that atleast the IT heads are aware of what they are dealing with and they train their teams on the precautions and the steps to be followed in preparing the devices and the scheduled maintenance that need to be performed to minimize the disasters.
BYOD is already proven to be the most efficient way to improve the productivity in any organization, but poor knowledge on it and without continuous security measures this policy could lead to a catastrophe, follow the right measures and have a great technique in implementing the policy.
