Guide: Telecom Expense Management Can Help Optimize BYOD
September 04, 2014
By Susan J. Campbell, TMCnet Contributing Editor
The way you stay in touch with your customers and colleagues is as critical to your bottom line as your business strategy. Without paying close attention, however, the costs associated with your telecommunications can get out of hand. For this reason, telecom expense management is picking up steam when it comes to popular applications.
Etelesolv recently announced the release of a Practical Guide to BYOD. Positioned as a comprehensive and accessible guide, this publication outlines how to design good Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policies, as well as detailed descriptions to BYOD alternatives. Given the rapid increase in mobility and the demand for use of personal phones for business purposes, BYOD is growing.
“Study after study in the workplace has shown BYOD to be a huge trend that is still growing. It is still in an early adopter stage and IT managers can find themselves unprepared to craft and implement practical BYOD policies,” said Nitin Khatri, vice president of sales and marketing at Etelesolv. “In many cases, BYOD’s massive hidden costs or its enormous capacity for enabling security breaches is undocumented. As a service to other businesses, we have created, and are giving away absolutely free of charge, a comprehensive guide that sheds light on all of these issues."
To enhance telecom expense management issues, the guide addresses specific topics, such as security issues, hidden and substantial costs involved, practical policy advice, benefits and drawbacks to alternatives, and more. As organizations try to embrace the opportunities afforded in BYOD, they’re often met with challenges associated with unforeseen issues and costs. As BYOD is often positioned as lowering communications costs, it’s easy for decision makers to assume telecom costs will go down.
Likewise, it’s also easy to assume that productivity will go up if employees have the opportunity to use their own devices in the field or at home to access the corporate network. While this capability may give them the opportunity to check in on the go, it doesn’t mean they aren’t also using this time to play a game, look at pictures of their children or even organize their apps. As none of these activities contribute to the efficiency of the job, they can quickly degrade the productivity benefits initially assumed with BYOD.
The key is to thoroughly understand the practice and what should be put in place to ensure BYOD delivers the intended benefits. Designing policies around key initiatives will help, and blending it into telecom expense management practices can ensure positive outcomes.