As devices proliferate, support is more critical and
more complex than ever.

By Paula Klein, Techweb

There's no longer any doubt: mobile devices-from smartphones to laptops-have become a permanent part of the business landscape. And it's not just Twitter or IM that are gaining traction in the workforce.

Aberdeen Group reports that the average employee spends close to 80 percent of their workday using some combination of enterprise applications and desktop tools. And Forrester estimates that 21 percent of North American adults work from home, either as home-based business owners, by telecommuting, or when taking their company laptop home to work after hours.

Now it's the job of IT executives to manage the proliferation, standardize incompatibilities, establish policies and set budget guidelines-and to do this without alienating the road warriors and mobile devotees in their midst.

Andrew Borg, senior research analyst of wireless and mobility at Aberdeen, surveyed 234 global enterprises of various sizes in September about mobile messaging and collaboration. He found strong interest in Windows Mobile version 7, iPhones and Google's new Android devices. Typical applications were e-mail, social media and remote access to office applications.

Borg notes that access to mission-critical apps like CRM, ERP, and even business intelligence, is on the rise, too. That means IT has to address concerns about nonstandard file formats, security, open systems and VPNs, among others. "Measuring and monitoring use is more important than ever," he says. CIOs can't "ignore or resist what comes in through the edges of the enterprise, they need to benchmark and deploy" them to avoid chaos, he says.

Currently, integrating mobile devices into the mainstream environment can be dicey. It takes "heavy lifting to move legacy apps and dashboards to handheld" devices, Borg says. Although security and wireless networks are improving, scalability remains a big challenge. Beyond road warriors, what Borg calls "carpet warriors"- who need mobility within buildings or on a campus-are the next mobile users to be addressed. "Enterprise mobility is only going to increase," he says.

Taking a hard line

Craig Mathias, a principal at Farpoint Group, a wireless advisory firm in Ashland, Mass., takes a hard line about what's needed to manage mobile environments. First, he says, devices have "to stop coming in the back door. Mobile devices, like all others, have to be managed and secured."

Mathias advises CIOs to look at mobile plans strategically. Instead of thinking like consumers, who want the latest and greatest technology, it's IT's job to say no-even to the CEO-if products are not cost-effective, or if they compromise the integrity of enterprise data. "Start with the mission, and then work from there," he says. [See "Expert Advice for Mobile Deployment" for more tips.]

Once the basic best practices are in place, forward-looking CIOs can look for ways to exploit mobile devices for productivity gains, improved collaboration and employee satisfaction. They can build on early successes-such as automated field service and sales departments-and find new user groups that can benefit from mobile rollouts, as well.

Soberman LLP., a leading Canadian accounting firm based in Toronto, increased productivity of mobile accountants in its tax division, who required anytime access to the corporate network while on the road, at customer sites and also from home.

The company wanted to offer transparent support and ease of use to about 60 mobile professionals, according to Robin Persaud, senior network engineer. "We wanted it to be easy to deliver policies, security and system access, without a 200-page booklet or long training sessions" with each user, he said.

The biggest challenge was finding a uniform, consistent, and secure way for users to connect to the office from different networks throughout the day, even from home. Persaud said adding 3G data cards provided another option, but also required more policies. At first, "we were so worried, we just disabled the home WiFi capability of our laptops," he said.

But while the caution was understandable, the rapidly growing mobile workforce needed more flexibility. In June, Soberman automated and consolidated access management and policy applications on laptops with software from Trellia Networks Inc. As a result, it can resolve problems faster, saving time for both the IT team and the mobile workforce.

The Trellia platform only allows trusted WiFi access points, and Soberman can enable it for home use with specially provisioned access points. IT can configure mobile-device software using a VPN or a wireless connection.

In addition to laptops, Soberman will support handheld devices for its workforce, but only those it approves. For example, Blackberries are allowed, but not other PDAs or smartphones that could crash the servers.

The compromise is working for Soberman so far, and employees seem happy-a big win for the business. Ultimately, "the business has to guide IT, and IT has to serve the business," Persaud says. The company will continue to look at business needs and phase in changes, he says. Possible upgrades will include access to dashboards, better corporate search, and data file and print offloads.

Sprawling support issues

Wireless sprawl is making the management job more difficult, according to Forrester. In an August report, Managing Global Mobility Support is Getting Harder, Forrester says that the major mobility support challenges for multinational businesses include: controlling international roaming costs; multi-country wireless service provisioning and contract management; integrating telecom expense and invoice management; managing device life-cycle; and establishing consistent global mobility policies.

Consultant Mathias warns that mobile connectivity costs are high "despite improvements in [network] throughput and availability." Laptops cost more than comparably equipped desktops and are costly to repair.

He says the basic question for CIOs to answer before they deploy widespread mobile networks is, "What are you trying to achieve? Look ahead, do pilots, otherwise, costs and complexity will get out of control," Mathias says. "Too many people buy first and then justify" the purchase.