The Majority of SMBs in the U.S. Have Official BYOD Policy

iGR is a market research firm. They consult market strategy in the wireless and mobile communications industry. In February 2013, iGR released the results of a study that they conducted which surveyed IT managers at small and medium sized businesses (SMBs) to see how they felt about employees bringing their own devices (BYOD) to work.

The survey noted that a majority of employees, 62 percent to be exact, reported that their company had an official BYOD policy. An even larger percentage, 73 percent of the employees surveyed said that their company unofficially allows them to use personal devices such as tablets and smartphones for work use.

What the “unofficial” status means is that even though the company knows that some employees are using their own personal devices for work purposes, they are neither allowing it on an official basis, but at the same time they are not stopping employees from bringing them and using them at work. Sort of a “don’t know, don’t tell” policy.

Iain Gillott, president and founder if iGR said, “Rather than reaching saturation, our survey results show that the number of employees who bring their own devices has grown significantly since 2012. There continue to be opportunities for BYOD solutions and strategies in this market. We found that the bring your own device trend is growing for tablets as well as smartphones.”

There are good and bad sides of BYOD. It actually helps the company in terms of keeping costs down. If you bring your tablet to work, the company doesn’t have the expense of procuring equipment. However, the flip side is, will the employee submit their wireless bill to the company since it they are using it for business purposes? Then the follow up question would be, how much of that bill was used for business purposes and how much for personal use?

As more tablets become available on the market, and prices drop, more people will buy them. Once they make the purchase, there will be a need on their part to use it and start to incorporate the convenience of it for both work and personal use. That is just human nature. It is a cost cutting option for SMBs, but there will also be the need to figure out how they should be used and managed.

Most SMBs are not likely to be hit with corporate espionage so security measures aren’t going to be at the government level. However, there will still be the need to temper the productivity factor with the freedom of using that tablet for personal use during the work day.