Alain Fontaine’s Jabberbox

A couple of days ago, after a tough day, I had a small discussion with one of my developers at work. I asked him to show me some document on his PC, and it took an awful long time for him to open it up because he mapped a network share on his private laptop he brought to work, and his laptop somehow stopped responding. My reaction was to say that this was an unacceptable loss of time and that I would think about no longer allowing people to bring their own gear to work.

Whilst I was driving home, I couldn’t get rid of the feeling that this was an emotional decision and that it felt wrong. Now that I took some time to think it over, I am sure that this is not what I will do in the future, but rather the opposite! I will encourage people to bring their own stuff to work, and even more than that…

In short, this concept is called BYOC – Bring Your Own Computer, and this is not something I invented. It is currently actively applied by several big companies, like Citrix, and Microsoft, in a way that I consider as very smart.

Let’s start with looking at the people who work in technology companies, especially developers. They are usually very tech-savvy and probably own better and faster hardware at home then what their employer could afford (whether it would make sense or not is another question). What’s more, the people I daily work with, use to frequently mix work and leasure with their computer gear, be it at home or at the office. It is frequent that my developers do some work related stuff at home, in the evening or during the week-end, and it is also a fact that people use MSN, Skype, FaceBook etc. at work for non-work related activities. This is an observation and a fact, and it has proven impossible to lock the IT workplace down to a level where such personal activities are impossible. Anyway, I consider that this has to be part of a sexy workplace. Some people take a cigarette break (bad for your health, remember), and other people use that time to say hello to lost and found schoolfriends on Facebook (which is better than smoking a cigarette, you’d agree!). In the end, it comes down to trust. You have to trust your people to behave responsibly.

So let’s take all of these ingredients again: tech-savvy people using their computer equipment for work and for leasure, at various locations, and at various times. Now what makes more sense: have many different computers at different places to do all of this, or just have one set of equipment that can be used to do all of it? You got it – solution two sounds like the way to go! Compare it to having two mobile phones, or just one. With two phones, you always have the wrong one with you, you don’t have the right contact details when you need them, and when you really need to place that important call, your batteries are empty. Have just one phone, and all of this is probably much easier to solve. Another example is that of a sales person having to use two cars. She drives to the office with her own car, then switches to the company car to drive to customers, and in the evening uses her own car again to drive home? That just doesn’t work.

Of course, there are fundamental issues with this idea.

1. Security
2. Cost
3. Maintenance
4. General IT policy

And probably others. Let’s look at these four more closely.

Security

You might say that this is a nightmare scenario in terms of security. If people bring their own hardware to work, it might be infected with all kinds of bad virii. But that is a non-problem. Or, to tell it differently, that is something that also needs to be taken care of on office hardware. Nowadays, there are so many different ways something bad can get into your company network, that a personal laptop is just one of many way. Think of USB keys, CDRoms, file downloads on the Internet, Skype, Trojans on compromised websites, … so many ways that there is no real way of making your company network a completely shielded environment, at least no without very seriously limiting your people’s productivity. I have friends who work in banks and for some stuff they have to use computers that have no Internet connection, don’t have a CDRom drive, no USB connectors… I call these computers ATARI’s or, worse, PONG arcade machines. In the end, handling the security aspects of a BYOC situation is exactly what you should already be doing today, with some adjustments.

Cost

- “But hey, why do I have to pay my own hardware to be able to work at your company?”

Good point. The answer is, you don’t have to. At least not completely. The company could agree on a defined amount of money that the employee can spend to buy his own hardware. For instance, a developer could get 1500 euro every two or three years as his IT budget that he can spend on buying his new laptop. If they want a top-notch machine they can add some quid to that. If they want an ultra-portable, they get one. If they prefer a desktop replacement because that fits their professional and private use better, they can. There are probably some financial issues to be solved with that, but I’m sure my colleagues from finance would find a good solution to that.

Maintenance

Computer maintenance is, in my opinion, another topic that can be handled easily in such a scenario. First of all, employees will probably take better care of their hardware themselves, because it is their hardware, not the companies. In addition, the IT support department can offer the professional support just as before, but in addition, they could also offer some support for personal, non work related issues. This will make sure every employee always has an up-to-date and working tool, and it will be an added bonus for the employees if they know they can also ask the company IT guru for some personal issues, like installing their latest webcam drivers and doing a software update for their personal expense tracker. Look at this like a feature that makes your company more sexy to employees. I wouldn’t go as far as helping the guys out with installing the latest games though, of course. Clearly, a detailed maintenance plan would have to be setup.

General IT policy

How do you go about the need of a uniform software set, for instance? If the company standard asks people to use MS Office 2003, but your employee wants to use Open Office? I think this can be handled in different way.

The first solution would be to let the employee handle this and define usage rules that say, for instance, “You have to be able to create and share office documents in the MS Office 2003 format with your colleagues and with customers”. Tech-savvy developers will know how to handle this, and you have to trust them in doing the right thing. Trust, and then verify, as my former CIO boss Chris Vulovic always says…

The second approach would be to use Virtual Desktops. The IT support department could create ready-to-use virtual desktops using VirtualBox or VMWare, that are pre-configured with all the needed software, VPN connections, etc. This would also be a very good way to enforce security and to be able to quickly roll-out or re-deploy work desktops. The hardware would have to be fast enough to handle this, but at the very cheap prices you can get CPU power and memory these days, that is not an issue anymore. You can get dual-core laptops with 3 gigs of RAM for less than 1000 euros now.

All put together, I have the feeling that this concept can really work out very well. My article doesn’t definitely go enough into detail in weighing out the pro’s and con’s, but I’m sure that with the help and input of my colleagues and managers, the idea could lead to a more productive and closer to real life work environment than what we have so far.

Let the comments flow now, I’m eager to read your opinion about the subject! And thanks for reading…

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.