02 Nov 2011, Daniel Robinson , V3
Much has been written about the consumerisation of IT, but the implications of this trend go much further than just companies allowing staff to bring their iPad to work. In the longer term, it could lead to a wholesale reorientation of the way businesses are organised, as well as radically changing the way IT services are delivered.
Dell and Intel are halfway through a project to examine the issues that are likely to confront enterprises in the future, and are to deliver their full findings in January.
In the meantime, the two companies have published an intermediate report entitled The Evolving Workforce, which identifies a number of trends indicating that companies will need to change the way they measure productivity, and foster greater employee involvement in coming up with solutions to IT problems in the future.
The main trend that will have an impact over the next five to 10 years is the consumerisation of enterprise IT, according to Bryan Jones, Dell's executive director for public and large enterprise.
This blending of personal technology and corporate technology, typified by 'bring your own device' policies, has been much discussed already, but Jones claimed that it is happening at an increasing rate, and that it is radically changing the expectations of end users.
"They want the same functionality, accessibility and productivity they get on a smartphone for their personal life in their professional environment, but right now in a lot of IT environments those two things don't intersect," he said.
The problem with a growing number of device types is picking the correct tool for the job, while the need for compatibility and interoperability becomes paramount, according to the report.
Another issue that will have to be overcome is security. New security models may have to be developed to cope with staff accessing data from outside the network, and companies will no longer be able to assume that data and applications are safe simply because they are behind the firewall.
But all of this will be nothing more than pie in the sky if IT chiefs see 'bring your own device' as simply an extravagance that they are unwilling to indulge, especially given the current economic conditions.
While this might be the case, IT managers are going to have to face the issue, according to Ian Jones, director of strategy at Intel.
"The classic IT manager might be caricatured as asking: 'How can I most easily keep my estate secure, and how can I keep costs down?', but what we are seeing is the emergence of forces that are influencing his hand in terms of people who are already bringing smartphones and tablets to work," he said.
Dell's Jones agreed, saying that cost avoidance and the lock-it-down mentality will "always be with us to a certain extent", but that the changes now taking place in IT offer potential opportunities for those prepared to take them.
"There will be a handful of organisations that find a way to embrace these concepts, and that is going to create a competitive advantage over everyone else," he claimed.
"The people that are going to take a chance and move out of their comfort zone are going to be the early adopters and pioneers, but I think over time everyone is going to have to deal with this idea of consumerisation on some level."
Both Bryan Jones and Ian Jones reiterated the view that companies adopting a more progressive attitude towards greater IT freedom will be a more attractive proposition for newly qualified workers, whereas those that are unwilling to change may struggle to fill vacancies.
Again this seems unlikely in the current economic climate. Few vacancies are on offer, and only the highest calibre graduates will be in a position to pick and choose employers.
Another development highlighted by Dell and Intel is changing work practices driven by greater mobile technology and always-on cloud services, which mean that workers are no longer confined to a single location, or to office hours.
This is having the knock-on effect of forcing companies to consider new ways of measuring productivity based on output instead of hours put in.
There is also the possibility of a rift developing between older and younger workers over the new ways of working, according to Intel's Jones. Older staff may be less accepting of technologies that may be perceived as intrusive, or may reject new IT-driven ways of working.
He cited an example where Lloyds of London moved from a paper-based system to using tablets, but ended up making the new system look and feel like using the paper system before it was accepted by the older staff.
However, new ways of working could also prove an opportunity for some companies through trends such as crowdsourcing and employee-led innovation, according to the Dell and Intel report.
Employee-led innovation is based on the notion that getting staff involved in all areas of developing IT solutions will ultimately deliver a better end result.
"The person best suited or best positioned to help you develop the right solution for your business internally, or the right product externally, is the end user of it," said Dell's Jones.
Of course, there are problems with this approach in terms of building up the right processes and infrastructure to facilitate employee input versus the traditional top-down approach of imposing solutions from above.
In a similar vein, the report found that some companies are exploring the concept of crowdsourcing ideas and even using crowdsourcing services to deliver products, as a method of streamlining the development process.
"It's centred around the concept of having a set of experts that can come together, create something, then disband and move on, and more and more businesses are interested in how to get some of that," said Dell's Jones.
Dell and Intel said they are focusing on the IT challenges required, such as the kind of infrastructure required to implement such an approach, but Dell's Jones conceded that there are "huge challenges" around this entire strategy, not least in keeping ideas and information confidential during development.
All of these trends are being driven by the consumerisation of IT and the blurring of boundaries now being seen between work and personal technologies, he said.
However, Jones added that "you've got to have some control" in order to keep sensitive information secure and make sure employees have the appropriate tools for their roles.
"How do you implement your IT to take account of this, and how do you take advantage of some of these things that may not on the surface appear to be a business application?", he said.
Source:http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/analysis/2121223/firms-embrace-crowdsourcing-employee-led-innovation-dell-intel
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