How employees are driving an iPad revolution, and what IT’s doing about it

September 15, 2011

 

Mirroring the adoption of smartphones and PDAs before it, the explosive growth of the iPad in business can be attributed almost entirely to employees’ obsession with Apple’s “magical” tablet.

The iPad’s transformation from consumer gadget to enterprise tool points the way to an employee-driven tech future in which users — not IT departments — get to choose their own gear and applications.

IT managers are learning how to adapt, fast.

“When the iPad was first released, we didn’t have any kind of enterprise strategy about supporting the device,” said Jeff Niblack, an IT manager at UnitedHealth Group, a diversified health and well-being company with over 80,000 employees worldwide.

“Within two weeks, we started getting our first inquiries. In the following two months, though, things really exploded, and I started getting requests for pulling iPads into nearly all aspects of the enterprise. There are now around 1,100 iPads deployed.”

Kaplan Higher Education agrees. The certificate and degree program company found itself bombarded with requests from employees who wanted to use their personal iPads on the job.

“Kaplan has a very young executive team and they were just in love with the iPad,” a Kaplan representative said. “They just started buying them, and so we had to learn to integrate the iPad as quickly as possible.”

Even the IT departments at smaller organizations are having problems with crowd control when it comes to denying iPads to their users.

Jeff Gargas is the IT Director for Robinson Engineering, a civil engineering firm with 120 employees spread across eight offices through the Chicago area. Robinson currently has a dozen iPads deployed, with more to follow.

At first, Gargas was nervous about giving iPads to his users.

“I’m a big fan of Apple products, so I was bringing my own iPad into work and using it for apps like Evernote, Dropbox and RemoteDesktop,” says Gargas. “Even so, one of the main reasons I was reluctant to deploy the iPad was because there’s no easy way to centrally manage the tablet, including mass-installing apps or connecting to files on our network.”

Eventually, Robinson Engineering realized it couldn’t keep employees from using their own iPads, and had to figure out how to make it work.

“As the iPad gained more traction and press, it became a lot more difficult to fend off people going, ‘Hey, why can’t we use iPads here?’” Gargas says. “Users started just purchasing their own and bringing them in, just like I did.”

“That was both a blessing and a nightmare: a blessing because we didn’t have to train users in how to user their iPads, a nightmare because we had no way to control them.”

The difficulty in centrally managing users’ devices is the biggest barrier to entry facing IT managers who want to deploy iPads to their users. For example, while Kaplan Higher Education eventually rolled out over 500 iPads to its users, it wasn’t easy, due to the company’s inability to distribute a device with a standard “image” of all the standard apps.

“That’s not the way Apple wants it done,” the Kaplan representative said. “They see the iPad as a personal device, each iPad as distinct as its owner.”

Problems that IT managers face in deploying iPads also include the mass purchasing of apps and the inability to add the iPad to corporate data plans.

Even so, Kaplan considers the rewards of deploying iPads to be greater than the drawbacks, and it is now considering giving iPads to as many as 10,000 students.

“Once the iPad’s actually out in a user’s hands, we love it. It’s easy to support. We don’t have to pay a company like Research in Motion licensing fees for a product like Blackberry Enterprise Server, since the iPad connects with Microsoft Exchange,” says Kaplan’s IT department.

Ultimately, IT managers seem to agree: Even though there are hurdles to deploying the iPad across an enterprise, the rewards are too great to ignore. But it does take a leap of faith.

What’s the lesson for businesses?

“Part of what we discovered here at Robinson Engineering was that letting our users figure out how to use their own iPads was the best part,” says Jeff Gargas. “If we hadn’t learned to trust our users and trust the iPad, I don’t think it would have been successful.”

As for Apple fans who want to use their iPads at work, the message is clear: The best way to get your company’s IT department to start supporting iPads is to bring yours to work and just start using it. Eventually, your company will have to catch up.

Photo credit: Nibaq/Flickr.com

How the enterprise is adopting tablets (infographic)

October 21, 2011 | Sean Ludwig

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It’s no secret enterprises have begun to adopt tablets with the same fervor of consumers. Since the debut of Apple’s iPad in Jan. 2010, the integration of tablet devices into our lives and work has progressed rapidly — so fast that it’s sometimes hard to put in perspective how quickly got here.

The exclusively obtained infographic below breaks down how far workforce adoption of tablet technology has come — and where it’s headed. (The graphic was sponsored by Lenovo and Qualcomm.)

In overall world market share for tablets, the iPad clobbers all others. The iPad accounted for nearly 80 percent of worldwide tablet sales during the past 12 months, but Android is slowly gaining ground, thanks to a wide variety of devices and prices. On the higher end, there are devices like the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and 8.9, and on the lower end there’s the upcoming Amazon Kindle Fire and already well-established Nook Color.

Enterprise adoption is quite different from total adoption. A just-released survey from Good suggests the iPad and iPad 2 were responsible for 96 percent of tablet activations in the enterprise in the third quarter of 2011. With just 4 percent of activations being Android-based, Apple has a clear lead with the enterprise crowd.

Business users have different needs with their tablets, chief among them are strong and versatile applications that keep the mobile workforce connected. The iPad has a clear lead in this area with more than 136,000 iPad-optimized apps while Google won’t reveal how many apps are actually optimized for Honeycomb-based tablets. (Some estimates guess it is under 1,000 at present.) One of the most promising enterprise applications we’ve seen recently is Polycom’s video-conferencing app that works for both iPad and Android tablets.

It’s unclear at this point if Android will be able to take away much of the share the iPad has secured with enterprise users, especially in Bring-Your-Own-Device workplaces. But we’ll be watching to see what happens in this exciting space and let you know the latest.

The ‘iDevice’ nightmare facing corporate IT shops

Employees want devices like Apple's iPad to work with their company's IT systems

Employees bringing their own gadgets, from smartphones to tablet computers, into the companies they work for and expecting them to function seamlessly with corporate technology systems is proving to be a significant and growing challenge for IT departments.

Warren Johnson, account technology specialist at Microsoft, says IT departments are struggling to
figure out how to accommodate the growing range of devices and online ecosystems that employees expect will interoperate with company-managed systems. In many cases it’s creating a security headache for IT directors, he says.

It’s becoming a tricky balancing act for many companies as they try to figure out how to benefit from this “consumerisation of IT”, while at the same time ensuring their systems aren’t compromised and the IT department doesn’t become overloaded because it’s supporting a multitude of nonsanctioned devices and ecosystems.

Employees are also expecting more from IT because they come across business systems online and want the technology function in their organisations to replicate it.

“We don’t see this trend stopping,” Johnson says. “IT has to catch up with what consumers are demanding.”

The question, he says, is whether they can. Though some companies are “really trying” to adopt and adapt to consumer technologies, it can become a “nightmare” to manage all the devices. “Internal developers are asking how they keep up with all the different technologies out there.”

The challenge for many IT departments is it’s often the CEO that is demanding his iPad or other new-fangled device interoperates seamlessly with the corporate backend systems, meaning they don’t have the choice of simply barring their use.

“The executives want the funky stuff. Four years ago they were saying you have to secure and manage everything because it’s too costly for us. Now they’re saying bypass it for me because I want my funky laptop.”

Johnson says embracing IT consumerisation has many benefits — and some employees may shun the idea of working for a company that doesn’t allow them to use their own gadgets for business purposes — but there are also big risks. “What if there is a zero-day attack on a platform you’re not in control of?”

Part of the solution, he says, is for companies like Microsoft to make it easier to develop applications that run across platforms. In Windows 8, the upcoming release of Microsoft’s dominant desktop operating system, developers will be able to write apps in Web-based programming languages and port these to other platforms.

“But it’s hard,” Johnson says. “We get organisations saying that if they allow users to bring in any device, then what sort of apps do they permit? If I can’t secure that device, how do I control which devices can have which apps with which data?”

Of course, not all organisations can allow consumer IT products and services. Johnson says Scotland Yard, by way of example, controls what devices are able to access its systems very tightly to prevent sensitive information from leaking. The organisation is strict about what devices, applications and data its employees may use.

But for many companies, embracing the trend has bigger benefits than trying to fight it, Johnson says.
Ultimately, he says, end-user devices will catch up with standards and allow IT departments to manage them better. “Manufacturers will come up with devices that support data encryption and they’ll be more on par with each other in terms of security and manageability.”

Until then, companies have a very real challenge on their hands: embrace the benefits and assume the risks, or try to move against the trend and face a revolt from users.
— Duncan McLeod, TechCentral

What is the Total Cost of Operating a Contact Center?

by Greg Smart -

 

People frequently ask me how much the technology costs to successfully run a contact center. What I find interesting about this question is that people often think that the technology component of running a contact center is one of the largest portions of the total cost of operation...but it isn't.

Experience has shown time and time again that there are four broad categories of costs in running a contact center business. Those four categories are:

1. Contact Center Staff and Labor
2. Contact Center Facilities and Overhead
3. Contact Center Technology and Maintenance
4. Contact Center Telecommunications and Networking

In addition, experience has also shown that about 75% of the costs of a contact center are for the Contact Center Staff and Labor and the remaining 25% is divided among the remaining categories: Facilities and Overhead, Technology and Maintenance, and Telecommunications and Networking in that order. Go ahead and check the math in your contact center. How do you size up? To help you out,

I have included a list of items for you to consider in each category when adding up the total cost of operating your contact center. Remember, some of these items are variable charges month to month, while others are fixed costs that must be spread across the year or month you are measuring.

Contact Center Staff and Labor

1. Wages, benefits, taxes and hiring costs of your contact center agents and supervisors and quality management staff
2. Salaries, benefits and taxes of your contact center management team
3. Chargebacks for business services such as HR, accounting, IT, etc. ( if applicable)

Contact Center Facilities and Overhead

1. Facility rent, utilities, maintenance and janitorial
2. Investment in office furniture and maintenance
3. Build-out and customizations made to the facility to accommodate growth
4. Supplies and consumables for the office and break facilities
5. Travel costs

Contact Center Technology and Maintenance

1. Investments in computers, headsets, telephones, monitors, printers, overhead displays
2. Technical support chargebacks or services
3. Technology maintenance contracts
4. Investments in Contact
5. Application and Storage Servers and Software for Contact Handling and Workforce Optimization applications
6. Contact Handling hardware if applicable including ACD, IVRs, Dialers

Contact Center Telecommunications and Networking

1. Dedicated Internet Access and mobile internet contracts
2. Dedicated T's and mobile voice contracts
3. Voice network per minute charges for toll free, local, and long distance usage
4. VoIP services

These items should get you thinking and cover the vast majority of the most significant costs of operating a contact center. As you can see, the technology investment is really only the tip of the iceberg.

Best wireless broadband deals « Broadband « MyBroadband Tech and IT News

Staff Writer

October 4, 2011

3 comments

MTN, 8ta, Cell C, iBurst, Neotel and Vodacom have all cut their broadband prices recently. Here are some of the best deals.

Summary: All of South Africa’s mobile and wireless broadband providers are currently running mobile broadband promotions. This includes uncapped broadband products from MTN and iBurst, and 8ta’s 10GB for R199.

Last week (29 September) iBurst slashed the price of their capped wireless broadband products. At the same time the company also launched their first uncapped broadband services.

iBurst’s new pricing and products come amidst a torrent of price cuts and new offerings from broadband providers.

It can be challenging to keep track of the best mobile and wireless broadband deals in the market, and the list below may assist you to stay on top of recent changes in the South African broadband market.

iBurst

• Uncapped for R599: Includes an uncapped account (with 1GB daily fair use policy) and a USB or desktop modem on a 24 month contract
• Uncapped+ for R879: Includes an uncapped account (with 3GB daily fair use policy) and a USB or 2Mbps desktop modem on a 24 month contract
• Pro 10 for R198: Includes 10GB of anytime data, 10GB of data to be used between 00:00 and 08:00 and a USB modem on a 24 month contract

MTN

• Uncapped Lite for R289: 3GB data bundle, after which service is throttled to 128kbps, but not capped. From 1 October 2011 to 31 January 2012 there will be no throttling. Comes with a MTN F@stlink USB modem on a 24 month contract.
• 2GB promotion for R149: 2GB of data and an MTN F@stlink USB modem on a 24 month contract.

Neotel

• NeoGo Datacard 2GB for R99: 2GB of data for an upfront payment of R299 and a month-to-month fee (no contract) of R99. A 3GB contract service without any up-front payment is available at R179 which includes the data card.

Cell C

• 24GB for R1,499: 2GB of data per month for 12 months and a 7.2Mbps data card for R1499 once off.
• 60GB for R2,999: 5GB of data per month for 12 months and a 7.2Mbps data card for R1499 once off.
• Recharge Rewards: Subscribers who recharge with R50 a week and receive 50 bonus SMSs, 50 Cell C to Cell C minutes and 500 Megabytes of data.

8ta

• 10GB for R199: 10GB of data per month on a 24 month contract for R199 per month. For R100 per month extra you can get another 10GB to be used between 00:00 and 05:00
• 2GB + 1GB for R149: 2GB prepaid data bundle for R149, with another 1GB which can be used between 00:00 and 05:00

Vodacom
Vodacom is currently running a ‘double your data’ promotion where users will get double the allocated data for Prepaid and Top Up once-off data bundles. This promotion applies to Broadband Standard MyGig 1, MyGig 1.5, MyGig 2 and MyGig 2.5 data bundles purchased between 19 September 2011 and 31 October 2011.

It should be noted that even with the additional data, Vodacom’s data prices remain uncompetitive when compared with the prices listed in this article.

Mobile Phones dominate in South Africa / Nielsen Wire

September 30, 2011 Jan Hutton, Director, Telecoms, Nielsen Southern Africa

Africa is in the midst of a technological revolution, and nothing illustrates that fact than the proliferation of mobile phones. Consider this: more Africans have access to mobile phones than to clean drinking water. In South Africa, the continent’s strongest economy, mobile phone use has gone from 17 percent of adults in 2000 to 76 percent in 2010. Today, more South Africans – 29 million – use mobile phones than radio (28 million), TV (27 million) or personal computers (6 million). Only 5 million South Africans use landline phones.

Nielsen’s recently released Mobile Insights study in South Africa, which examined consumers’ usage of and attitudes toward mobile phones, networks and services, reveals a number of interesting insights:

- High levels of network loyalty: 95 percent of subscribers have been with their carrier for an average of 4.2 years, and 81 percent said they’d recommend their network providers to friends and family, reinforcing the importance of word-of-mouth and reputation in the industry.
- Move from pre-paid to contracts: While pre-paid plans still make up between 82 and 85 percent of the market, 25 percent of subscribers say they could switch from pre-paid to contract packages within the next year.
- Network quality a key decision factor: More than a quarter (27%) said they left their previous provider due to poor network quality.
- Nokia rules: More than half (52%) own that company’s handsets, followed by Samsung and BlackBerry, and 56 percent of those currently using other brands indicated their next handset would likely be a Nokia.

How do South Africans Use their phones?

As in other countries, mobile phones are being used in a range of ways aside from talking. South Africa ranks fifth in the world for mobile data usage, ahead of the United States, which ranks seventh.

More than 20 percent of those surveyed said they download ringtones and a similar number said they download music. Wallpapers, screensavers and pictures are also popular downloadables. The mobile phone as an Internet device is also on the rise – 11 percent of South Africans use their mobiles to go online, and consumers aged 25-34 are the heaviest users.

Facebook is the most popular social media platform, used by 85 percent of mobile subscribers. Half of all users of Facebook in South Africa access the site via their mobiles. MXIT, a mobile instant messaging platform, is also popular in the country, with 61 percent saying they access the site. SMS text messaging is practically ubiquitous among South African mobile customers, and is used by almost 4.2 times more people than e-mail.

More than two-thirds (69%) of consumers prefer sending texts to calling, in large part because it is less expensive, and 10 percent believe texting to be a faster way of communicating.

The majority (60%) of South African mobile users said they are aware of mobile banking services offered by banks, but only 21 percent say they use such services. A much larger number of those aware of the services said they would never use them, suggesting banks might need to invest in communicating the benefits and security of mobile banking.

This survey provides a comprehensive benchmark against which the changes occurring in the rapidly evolving telecom sector can be measured. When one considers that just three years ago, there were no smartphones being used on the continent, the pace of change is stunning. South Africa is the biggest market, but other countries on the continent are likely to catch up fast.