AS IRISH COMPANIES DEMAND MORE FLEXIBILITY, SECURITY AND EFFICIENCY OVER MOBILE, MANAGED MOBILE SERVICES ARE SET TO SKYROCKET IN 2020!

Great guest post by Head of Direct Sales at Vodafone Ireland, Alan Claffey. Where he discusses how a shift in customer demand is causing businesses to turn to increasingly sophisticated technology solutions to manage day-to-day services

The appetite for new smarter ways of working across Irish businesses continues to grow at a phenomenal pace, fuelled, in part, by evolving customer and employee demand. Moreover, it reflects the future of how businesses will operate, resulting in a move away from the traditional 9 to 5 ‘office’ environment, to a more flexible ‘work anywhere, anytime’ model.

Employees, therefore, expect remote access and real-time collaboration, with the choice to work flexibly when they want, where they want and with the tools of their choice. By embracing this change and having the correct mobility strategy in place, it enables organisations to give user’s choice and control to work more productively and efficiently – with the right mobile technology.

Successfully utilising mobile solutions can prove to be a more efficient, not to mention incredibly productive, way to drive business growth, but managing various mobile devices can be cumbersome or costly for an organisation.

Therefore digital transformation is often necessary to achieve success. To introduce a smart working policy, for instance, organisations need the right device, and the best security available, to protect their business and customer information. In addition, businesses are actively seeking support from their network provider to help get the best use of their connectivity across an expanding estate.

One rising star in the new world of business communications is ‘Managed Mobility’, which provides organisations with a comprehensive approach to securing and enabling their employees to use smartphones and tablets. It encompasses tools, technologies, processes and policies that collectively keep the organisation secure and ready to embrace change.

An example of this is Vodafone’s SD-WAN – a virtual solution that sits over a company’s existing network and gives immediate visibility and control of their network traffic. The solution enables businesses to manage all applications, devices and bandwidth usage through a single self-service portal. This solution, which comes with a bespoke managed service offer, has a team of experts from Vodafone providing an end-to-end technology solution.

To create this flexibility and mobility required to keep pace with the ever-changing environment, there is a pressing need to breakdown the traditional model of technology in business, including complicated hardware and software systems. Organisations and their employees need secure business-ready devices with data and cloud-based applications to ensure they are ready for this step change.

Putting the physical and practical elements aside, unmanaged mobility environments cost enterprises 20% more than managed ones according to a US study. The study also estimates that managed mobility solutions offer a three-year return on investment of 184%. This means there are major financial incentives for businesses to adopt this type of service.

Yet successfully implementing managed mobility – as with any initiative that reaches so deeply into every part of an organisation – is no trivial matter. The following five steps will help you prepare for as smooth a transition as possible.

Define the terms of reference

The first step is getting your team to reach an agreement on the overall objectives. Everyone should clearly understand all the potential benefits of the proposed solution, and reach consensus on exactly what managed mobility services should mean for your organisation.

Business case part 1 – strategy

These objectives will inform your initial stages of business planning. Everyone from across the business – from HR to procurement, legal to operations, finance to line of business – should provide additional input over what the ideal solution should look like.

Business case part 2 – solution

The next step is to identify the technical solution or service that best fits the business case, and carefully consider whether it meets all your objectives. That might involve security assessments, investigating new opportunities, and anything that will help you finalise your business case and be clear on what you’re doing.

Transform

Every person in your organisation with a mobile device will be part of the IT journey and so part of the new solution’s success. Working together with your vendor, you should, therefore, prepare your employees for the new way of working, and – crucially – for the process of change.

5. Track progress

Relentlessly monitor the success of the new solution or service. Is it delivering against the objectives set out in your business case? Does any further work need to be done to achieve those goals? Are your users happier? Are there any further opportunities for your business created by the new solution? And here’s where your choice of vendor will become really important.

Conclusion:

Organisations are truly starting to understand what it means to be ‘digital first’ and are embracing the services that will bring them the flexibility to manage consumer demand, recruit talent and expand their business while seeking out the external supports that manages all this on their behalf. It is the year of total managed mobility.

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