BYOD + BYON + BYOA (+ UC) = “Multimodal” Services

If you have been reading the reviews of Cisco’s recent big conference of analysts, channel partners, and consultants in L.A., you will see the marketing emphasis is focused on “end user experiences,” rather than just technology cost savings. Although Cisco highlights “collaboration” as the epitome of their technology benefits, they really are going after all types of business interactions that UC enablement supports. That includes both people contacts as well as automated business applications.

As noted by my colleague, Blair Pleasant, since 95 percent of Cisco sales are done by channel partners, presentations by several partners at the conference stressed the fact that business management, not IT, is setting the priorities for implementing new forms of business communications and application automation. With growing interest in hosted, “cloud”-based applications, this trend will only increase even further in the future.

Separation of Church and State

What was not discussed very much was the impact of mobility and UC-enablement on end users, both inside an organization, as well as external customers and business partners. While desktop activities, including laptops, can benefit from UC integrations, the real demand for UC flexibility will come from mobile users whose needs will constantly change dynamically. As “BYOD” policies, coupled with “cloud” applications, replace or supplement traditional desktop activities, the role and responsibilities of the organization vs. that of the individual end user for controlling device usage activities will change significantly.

When we talk about “end user,” we now have to include consumers/customers, who are all now able to access online applications from their personal smartphones and tablets, and therefore can do things directly by themselves without necessarily going through a call center agent. To me, that will prove to be the biggest driver for flexible UC-enablement and self-service applications to any organization, large or small.

However, we need to separate what the “church” (organization) controls from what the “state” (end users) controls. Obviously, there will be “different strokes for different folks” when it comes to the options for different end users. Across the board, access to information and applications can now be selectively controlled by the organization to authorized end users, but communication access with people must be controlled by the individual end users, either as contact initiators or as contact recipients. The exception to the latter is a customer contact center environment, where customer-facing agents must make themselves available on a scheduled basis.

“BYOD” Will Need “BYON” Connectivity To “Cloud” Applications (“BYOA”)

Just as end users get to choose their own mobile devices for both business and personal contacts and applications, they will also have to have access to any type of network connection associated with their application. While in the past, cell phones required carrier services and cell towers for off-premise voice connections coverage, new multi-modal smartphones and tablets are creating greater demand for low-cost local Wi-Fi networks for information and people access. Although enterprise organizations may still provide their own premise-based Wi-Fi facilities, the real world of BYOD users includes all consumers who can now exploit online access to self-services and live assistance.

To accommodate mobile workers who need inexpensive mobile connections, new service providers, like iPass, are offering global, “cloud”-based, Wi-Fi services to organizations to control and manage all their mobile business contacts. For interesting insights on mobile work usage, check out iPass's recent end-user global study.

As mobile applications move into the clouds, UC enablement will be there to support end user needs for greater flexibility in user interfaces for all forms of communication and information access via their multi-modal smartphones and tablets.  

3 Responses to "BYOD + BYON + BYOA (+ UC) = “Multimodal” Services" - Add Yours

Art Rosenberg 10/25/2012 2:49:04 PM

Just after posting this perspective on the personalization of business technologies, I got this interesting whitepaper on "Bring Your Own Technology" (BYOT). What this trend suggests is something I wrote about several years ago, i.e., organizations need to focus on securing their proprietary information, which can be selectively accessed by authorized users only through controlled applications.

Putting those capabilities into private or public "clouds" doesn't change that basic responsibility. However, as such information increasingly moves over wireless connections to mobile devices, individual user identity authentication and encryption will become very important table stakes. Also, end users may have to be restricted with what they do with confidential information, e.g., they can only look at it and use it in within authorized applications, but can't copy it or print it.

Here's the white paper:

Charting The Rising Tide Of Bring-Your-Own Technology

When employees first started bringing their own devices (BYOD) to work, IT had to scramble to create infrastructure and processes that could support such a wide array of form factors and operating systems.

But with devices comes technology. And if an employee is going to BYOD, then BYOT or Bring Your Own Technology isn?t far behind.

Unlike BYOD, BYOT takes into account additional form factors, as well as platforms, application software, and web-based services like storage and collaboration that employees may choose to utilize. This is a trend that will increasingly affect the policies and budgets of CIOs over the next 2-3 years.

Download this white paper:

http://links.mkt1985.com/ctt?kn=2&ms=NDQ0MTQ5MwS2&r=MTg5MDYxNDE0MDMS1&b=0&j=MTMyMzI2NTQzS0&mt=1&rt=0

makenna fulwood 11/5/2012 1:14:27 PM

Even though Big Data and Aaas is seen as the biggest things in enterprise, I think BYOD will have the biggest impact on businesses. As you also point out, BYOT is what all these trends will evenutally bring to enterprise, but I think IT departments will still be the gatekeepers. Some will use large BYOD systems, or like us use focused software or apps. One of our doctors suggested a HIPAA complient text messaging app called Tigertext, IT reviewed and found it a good technology, and so we changed our BYOD policy and got it on all the doctors devices. I think this is a good example of BYOT shaping a BYOD policy via the IT department.

Art Rosenberg 11/6/2012 8:23:22 AM

Makenna,

I agree with your perspective on the dominant role of BYOD that then leads to both business and communication apps. I define "communication apps" as being "person-to-person" contacts, such as your Tigertext application for secure text messaging, while business applications are process-person. The latter can be communication-enabled (CEBP) for outbound notifications, and, of course, "online" for direct user access.

And yes, IT has to endorse such application functionality from wherever it is provided, i.e., premise-based, private, public clouds. Messaging needs a lot more improvements to be made, for both senders and recipients, and they will all be "UC-enabled" and become more available in "clouds."