Journal of Business StrategyLeaving employees to their own devices: new practices in the workplaceAurelie Leclercq-Vandelannoitte

Article information:To cite this document:Aurelie Leclercq-Vandelannoitte , (2015),"Leaving employees to their own devices: new practices in the workplace", Journalof Business Strategy, Vol. 36 Iss 5 pp. 18 - 24Permanent link to this document:http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/JBS-08-2014-0100

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Leaving employees to their own devices:new practices in the workplace

Aurelie Leclercq-Vandelannoitte

Aurelie Leclercq-Vandelannoitte is AssociateProfessor at the IÉSEGSchool of Management,LEM (CNRS 9221), Lille,France.

Introduction

In the past, organizations, and their information technology (IT) departments in particular,chose which IT and applications their workers would use, as well as why, how and whenthey could use them. In modern organizations, workers instead decide which IT andapplications to use, as well as why, how, and when. That is, in just a few years, traditionalIT equipment and adoption logics have been completely reversed.

Rather than originating in business markets, then becoming dominated over time by highervolume consumer usage, such new IT emerged first on the consumer market and thenstarted entering the organizational sphere. This IT consumerization, defined as theadoption of consumer applications, tools and devices in the workplace (Moschella et al.,2004; Gens et al., 2011, Vile, 2011; Ortbach et al., 2013), constitutes perhaps “the mostsignificant trend affecting IT in the next 10 years” (Gartner, 2012). It parallels somecompanies’ deployments of “bring your own device” (BYOD) programs, which allow orencourage employees to use their own personal devices to complete work-relatedactivities. However, and despite the importance of this growing phenomenon, very fewcompanies address the implications of IT consumerization and BYOD. Rather, they tend todevelop overly simplistic approaches to BYOD, such as banning or avoiding the trend outof fear of security threats (D’Arcy, 2011). Yet, BYOD is neither a fashion nor a new trend; itis an objective fact that affects organizations and obliges them to rethink some coreprocesses, models and practices. Thus, it becomes urgent for companies not only tounderstand this growing phenomenon but also to anticipate and support it with the mostappropriate strategies, rather than suffering less-than-optimal outcomes due to IT usagesthat they have not chosen and cannot control.

The apparent lack of interest among managers and the research gaps instead have leftmany questions unanswered (Crowston et al., 2010; Niehaves et al., 2012):

Q1. What are the consequences of renewed and reversed individual IT adoption logicsfor organizations?

Q2. How can organizations manage technologies that they have not procured orprovisioned?

Q3. How should IT departments react to potential threats to their information systems(IS) and networks?

Q4. Should they continue to strive to control all aspects of the company’s IS (e.g. data,hardware, software)?

Q5. To what extent should companies encourage employees to bring their own IT towork, versus providing employees with professional devices?

PAGE 18 JOURNAL OF BUSINESS STRATEGY VOL. 36 NO. 5 2015, pp. 18-24, © Emerald Group Publishing Limited, ISSN 0275-6668 DOI 10.1108/JBS-08-2014-0100

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Q6. What kind of innovations might organizations foster? And ultimately, should theyeven bother?

We consider the need to understand the business challenges and implications of reversedadoption logics – including the risks and opportunities they present for organizations –pressing. This article offers an overview of this growing but under-researchedphenomenon. Our goal in turn is to move beyond the classic discourse that appears inpractitioner studies about the security threats of BYOD and provide useful insights to bothmanagers and academic researchers. Accordingly, we undertake an in-depth analysis ofexisting literature, from which we identify changes introduced in organizations by reversedadoption logics. These findings help shed light on the stakes involved in BYOD and ITconsumerization, as well as the changes they imply for organizations. Our ultimate goalthus is to help organizations understand how to manage this growing trend and address itsimplications.

IT consumerization: a growing but under-appreciated trend

People’s growing dependence on technologies and the Internet, combined with the fastdemocratization of powerful technological devices (e.g. laptops, smartphones, tablets) andthe rapid explosion of social media, has led to new work behaviors and attitudes toward ITusage, as summarized by the concept of IT consumerization. This growing trend transformsthe top-down, organizational-level equipment policy into a bottom-up diffusion of IT at theindividual level (Figure 1) (Author, 2014). That is, IT deployment in organizations is nolonger initiated by management but rather is pushed by younger, more mobile, technicallyliterate workers, who have never known a world without the Internet or IT (D’Arcy, 2011).

This young, empowered workforce is less tied to tradition and less inclined to drawboundaries between corporate and personal forms of technology. In addition, they arefamiliar with leading-edge technologies, and using their own devices at work represents aperceived right, not a privilege. Many of these employees already have equippedthemselves with sophisticated technologies at home; they own a multitude of sophisticated,affordable devices, diverse in their functionalities, and they are never far from their ownsmartphones, tablets or laptops. These technological devices are even smaller, smarter,cheaper and more powerful than traditional enterprise desktops and IT (Harris et al., 2011).Finally, modern communication capabilities enable workers to access their internalcompany networks with nearly any device and virtually anywhere.

In turn, workers’ personal IT is so imbricated in their daily lives that they reject the idea oflosing access to their sophisticated devices or having to use less efficient devices at work.

Figure 1 Two logics of IT deployment in organizations

From a “top-down” ITequipment policy at theorganiza�onal level…

…To a “bo�om-up”diffusion of IT at the

individual level

IT consumeriza�on & BYOD

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They generally regard their personal tools as more powerful, more useful, more capable,faster and more fun than the enterprise IT provided by their companies (Harris et al., 2011).Because of their conviction that their personal devices and applications make them moreeffective in carrying out their missions, they expect to be able to use them at work too, tomanage their jobs and connect freely with enterprise IS. These trends and beliefs explainwhy more workers now use their own technologies at work, regardless of official companypolicies and with or without their managers’ approval (Harris et al., 2011).

Yet, managers’ attention to this growing trend appears limited. For example, ITconsumerization mainly has catalyzed concerns about IS security and reliability (D’Arcy,2011), as well as employees’ performance if they get distracted from their work missions bythe use of more fun personal technologies. Accordingly, most studies of BYOD in bothprofessional and academic outlets adopt IT security and cost-efficiency perspectives. First,a successful BYOD strategy should incorporate a secure infrastructure (e.g. wireless localarea networks that link all devices to the company’s IS; security identity services; datainfrastructure, training, and procedures). Second, managers acknowledge that a reversedadoption logic could reduce organizational expenditures on IT infrastructure, though thehidden costs of technology standardization and internal organizational compatibility alsodemand consideration (Kaneshige, 2012).

Even in companies that have started to recognize the growing use of consumer IT at work(Brousell, 2012), many managers tend to regard each initiative as an insular occurrence,unrelated to other examples (Harris et al., 2011). As a result, few organizations explicitlyaddress or manage the expanded blending between personal and business uses oftechnological devices and applications. To create a cohesive strategy for ITconsumerization, they must first understand the nature and implications of the vastchanges this trend promises for organizations and their IT strategies.

A new area of innovation, openness and flexibility

Beyond representing technological trends, IT consumerization and BYOD have a key rolein organizations because they constitute exciting opportunities, huge challenges andsubstantial implications for organizations. Consumer IT is easy to implement, can fosterinnovation and can potentially enhance employees’ creativity, productivity and satisfaction(Harris et al., 2011). Thus:

� a salesperson might bring her own laptop to the office;

� a director can finish a report or respond to e-mails while in a doctor’s waiting room;

� a representative could rely on location-enabled mapping, expense management andother consumer applications (e.g. Google Docs, Yahoo Messenger) on his smartphoneto maintain closer connections with clients;

� a CEO might use her iPad to present up-to-the-minute results to the board; and

� a nurse could use his camera phone to relay images of patient wounds and therebyenhance patient care.

All these examples represent creative uses of consumer IT by employees withinorganizations, with clear value for companies. Specifically, these workers improvise inusing their personal technology in new, sometimes unanticipated ways, and companies inturn can enjoy transformed, improved business processes.

‘‘In modern organizations, workers instead decide which ITand applications to use, as well as why, how, and when.’’

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The changes induced by IT consumerization and BYOD also go deeper, in that they promptorganizations to become more open, fluid and flexible by creating a new corporate space,characterized by greater digital freedom. For example, new forms of mobility likely emerge,because workers can access any information from any location with any chosen device.With more options than ever before, they work with the device and format that best suitsthem, whether in the office, from home or on the move (Choo, 2011). Because they are freeof the rigid methods that IT departments and management might have imposed previously,workers can decide how to work, when and where it is most convenient for them. Forexample, cloud-based e-mail enables workers to access their electronic mailboxes from asmartphone, tablet, or other device, nearly regardless of time, location, and software, whichmeans they likely can obtain relevant information, communicate, and work anywhere andanytime (Choo, 2011). Workers also achieve greater flexibility and empowerment when theygain greater control over how they can manage the increasing demands of theirprofessional and personal lives.

In renewed “enterprises in motion” (Choo, 2011), the static workplace becomesdynamic. Companies that welcome and support such practices often appeal more tocurrent and potential employees. To attract the most elite, technologically savvyemployees, companies must give them choice and flexibility in how they work, includingin the devices they use, and ensure comparable experiences, regardless of how theyaccess the company’s IS. Such conditions might enhance organizational productivityand motivation, which means that IT consumerization and BYOD require strategicconsideration by organizations.

Waves of change in IT strategies and business models

The new openness and flexibility that accompany BYOD eventually will alter the face,missions, power and role of IT departments completely. These trends, accordingly, willfundamentally and irreversibly transform companies’ IT strategies (Harris et al., 2011),especially considering that the capabilities of consumer IT tend to outpace those achievedby enterprise IT (Murdoch et al., 2010). The constitution of complex, individualized systems,featuring various privately owned and company-provided IT (Ortbach et al., 2013),contribute to the process of the individualization of IS within companies (Baskerville, 2011).

This trend also creates waves of change for business and IT strategies and models. Theimpact on corporate IT departments is especially notable: Whereas they traditionallycontrolled the technologies that employees used to perform their jobs, the “sovereignterritory” of enterprise IT is being invaded by consumer IT (Cisco, 2012). Consumer IT hasspread throughout organizations at remarkable speed, with levels of maturity, support andmaintenance quality that seemingly never would have been accepted in the past by ITdepartments, managers or organizations. As a result, the traditional business models ofmost IT departments have been forced to adjust. Because they no longer provide theiremployees with technological devices, they cannot control their IT uses anymore. Thisaltered role for IT departments can be troublesome though, because it likely leads them toperceive a loss of power.

In this vein, many IT managers express fear about the consequences of relaxing theircontrol over the company’s IT environment and infrastructure and seek to maintain tightcontrols over IT usages within the firm. Others attempt to avoid allowing employees to use

‘‘IT deployment in organizations is no longer initiated bymanagement but rather is pushed by younger, more mobile,technically literate workers.’’

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their own devices at work at all. A 2011 study, thus, revealed that “80 per cent of ITprofessionals were opposed to the use of consumer technologies in the workplace” (Harriset al., 2011). Yet, 40 per cent of chief information officers also believe that companies willstop providing employees with physical desktops within five years (Cisco, 2012). Thus, ITmanagers face a difficult dilemma between their perceptions of their classic missions, rolesand duties and what they recognize as the ineluctable evolution of the IT environment.

Examples of companies that have successfully tackled this trend and the associated dilemmaare instructive. They offer a resolution, achieved by helping IT departments rethink their missionin the company (Vignette 1). The idea is to free IT departments from some of their traditionalroles and duties (e.g. provision of and control over IT), leaving them with more time to pursueinnovative, strategic projects. In this view, BYOD and IT consumerization represent unexpectedopportunities for IT departments and information officers to turn their attention to long-term ITstrategies and take a critical, strategic role in their organizations.

Conclusion

Rather than simple fads or trends, IT consumerization and BYOD exert notable impacts onorganizations (Table I).

Vignette 1. A company that has coped successfully with BYOD

Example: the case of Volvo

Instead of ignoring a growing phenomenon or limiting employees to professional devices,Volvo decided to support them by offering a dedicated service, designed specifically to helpworkers benefit from the uses of their own, personal devices (smartphone, tablet).

Specifically, to address growing demands by employees for access to corporate data on the road,Volvo’s IT department created a customized service, through which employees may installcorporate applications (e.g. office software) on their personal mobile devices. Employees whochoose to do so can access e-mails, electronic diaries and contact information from a distance;more than 12,000 devices are thus linked. As an innovation manager in Volvo’s IT departmentexplains, “There is a real willingness from our employees to centralize their personal andprofessional usages on their own device”. Yet, this usage remains voluntary; rather than any ITusage policy being imposed, employees choose whether to use their own device or not to accesscorporate data and IS.

Although Volvo acknowledges the importance of corporate data security and networkprotection (e.g. if a worker loses a personal device to theft or misplacement, Volvo IT canremotely delete all corporate data), security is not the top priority. The most important focusis “open innovation”, the name Volvo gave its new program. Through open innovation, thecompany can identify priorities and involve multiple employees in generating and diffusinginnovative ideas. Numerous improvements, suggested spontaneously by workers, alreadyhave been implemented. In turn, Volvo IT already has decided to expand the service with newapplications to help meet other demands from workers (e.g. booking a taxi, completingexpense accounts, planning).

As the innovation manager further explains, “Participative innovation is at the heart of our culture,and our collaborators are very engaged in idea sharing to help us develop our internal andexternal services and strategies. Our approach is very pragmatic: We decided to provide ourworkers with access to corporate applications that seemed essential, like the emails and agendasand then our goal has been to make the service evolve, according to the expectations of theemployees. I think that managing BYOD as a whole from the beginning is not a good tactic; it’s farmore important to study IT usages closely and anticipate the needs of the future”. The result is arenewed, more strategic role for the IT department. Furthermore, the company can now sell itselfas a highly attractive workplace to prospective employees.

Source: Volvo (2012)

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To address the lack of research on this central topic for organizations (Crowston et al.,2010; Niehaves et al., 2012), this article analyzes how companies might embrace BYOD, adecision that will affect not only the technologies used within the company but also the ITstrategies, innovation processes, creativity and well-being of its employees. If successfullyembedded into the strategy of the organization, IT consumerization and BYOD can delivertangible business benefits, including efficiency, productivity, cost savings and processimprovements. Companies that successfully redefine their perspective on mobility andBYOD and IT strategies, thereby adapting to these broader changes, will gain criticalcompetitive advantages. Not least of all, it will help them attract the best employees to jointheir workforce.

References

Baskerville, R. (2011), “Individual information systems as a research arena”, European Journal ofInformation Systems, Vol. 20 No. 3, pp. 251-254.

Brousell, L. (2012), “Exclusive research shows CIOs embrace consumerization of IT”, CIO.com,available at: www.cio.com/article/694609/Exclusive_Research_Shows_CIOs_Embrace_Consumerization_of_IT (accessed 26 September 2012).

Choo, N. (2011), “The new mobility–the enterprise in motion”, Network World Asia, Vol. 8 No. 4, p. 42.

Cisco (2012), “BYOD: Realising the business benefits”, White Paper, Intrinsic Technology.

Crowston, K., Fitzgerald, B., Gloor, P., Schultze, U. and Yoo, Y. (2010), “Shifting boundaries: howshould IS researchers study non-organizational uses of ICT?”, ICIS 2010 Proceedings, St Louis, MO.

D’Arcy, P. (2011), CIO Strategies for Consumerization: The Future of Enterprise Mobile Computing, DellCIO Insight Series.

Gartner (2012), “Gartner says the personal cloud will replace the personal computer as the center ofusers’ digital lives by 2014”, available at: www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id�1947315 (accessed 11September 2012).

Gens, F., Levitas, D. and Segal, R. (2011), Consumerization of IT Study: Closing the ConsumerizationGap, IDC, Framingham, MA.

Harris, J.G., Ives, B. and Junglas, I. (2011), “The genie is out of the bottle: managing the infiltration ofconsumer IT into the workforce”, Accenture Institute for High Performance, available at: www.accenture.com/SiteCollectionDocuments/PDF/Accenture-Managing-the-infiltration-of-Consumer-IT-into-the-workforce.pdf (accessed 5 October 2012).

Kaneshige, T. (2012), “BYOD: if you think you’re saving money, think again”, CIO.com, available at:www.cio.com/article/703511/BYOD_If_You_Think_You_re_Saving_Money_Think_Again (accessed 17May 2013).

Moschella, D., Neal, D., Opperman, P. and Taylor, J. (2004), The “Consumerization” of InformationTechnology, CSC, El Segundo, CA.

Murdoch, M., Harris, J. and Devore, G. (2010), “Can enterprise IT survive the meteor of consumertechnology?”, Accenture Institute for High Performance, available at: www.accenture.com/

Table I Transformations of IT departments due to BYOD impacts

Criteria From . . . To

Usage One device, one task Anytime, anywhere, any device(ATAWAD)

Connectivity Limited Permanent and continuousDeployment logic Top-down Bottom-up

Organizational initiative Individual initiativeIT department role Provision and control of IT Strategic

Sovereign territory of enterprise IT Anticipation of employees’ needsInnovative projects

Short term Long termOrganization Fixity in static workplaces Mobility, fluidity and dynamic

workplacesEnterprise in motion

Keywords:Information technology,Adoption logics,BYOD,CIO,Consumerization,Individualization

VOL. 36 NO. 5 2015 JOURNAL OF BUSINESS STRATEGY PAGE 23

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SiteCollectionDocuments/PDF/Accenture_Can_Enterprise_IT_Survive_the_Meteor.pdf (accessed 7December 2013).

Niehaves, B., Ortbach, K. and Koeffer, S. (2012), “IT consumerization – a theory and practice review”,Proceedings of the Eighteenth Americas Conference on Information Systems, Seattle, WA.

Ortbach, K., Bode, M. and Niehaves, B. (2013), “What influences technological individualization? Ananalysis of antecedents to IT consumerization behavior”, Proceedings of the Nineteenth AmericasConference on Information Systems, Chicago, IL.

Vile, D. (2011), The Consumerisation of IT, Freeform Dynamics, New Milton, Hampshire.

Volvo (2012), “Gestion du BYOD, l’exemple de Volvo IT”, available at: www.volvoit.com/volvoit/france/fr-fr/_layouts/CWP.Internet.VolvoCom/NewsItem.aspx?News.ItemId�123017&News.Language�fr-fr

Corresponding author

Aurelie Leclercq-Vandelannoitte can be contacted at: a.leclercq@ieseg.fr

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