From a theoretical perspective, the potential benefits of a business moving some or all of their IT systems to a cloud environment are impossible to deny. However, in order to really get the bottom of what makes cloud so useful in today's business environment, it can be helpful to focus on something a little less abstract, and instead take a look at some actual use cases where cloud is changing business equations and giving some organizations a competitive advantage.
One area where this is happening right now is enabling the anywhere, anytime worker. Today's workers have largely outgrown the traditional workstation arrangement. They have grown accustomed to using powerful mobile devices in their personal lives, doing essentially whatever they want, wherever they want, whenever they want. It's no surprise to see many employees start to demand the same kind of capabilities in their professional lives.
Using cloud to allow employees access to work emails, corporate data, and important business applications on whatever device they prefer to use can help keep employees satisfied, while also making the business more agile and responsive to business trends. At the same time, cloud allows this to happen in a way that does not put the company or its data at risk.
Cloud-based email
Email is at the center of everything your business does. It's no exaggeration to say you couldn't function without the ability to drive instant communication between employees, customers and partners. As a result, any bring-your-own-device program you attempt to roll out within your organization should logically include a cloud-based email component.
Of course, just enabling access to work emails on any device is easy enough to accomplish; what's really important is that you're able to accomplish this goal in a manner that keeps the emails safe. Leading cloud solutions such as Microsoft Office 365 and Google Apps for Business provide a simple way to make this happen. Once your employees can effectively communicate on any device, from wherever they are in the world, enabling them to work the way they want becomes a lot simpler.
Cloud-based data access
Another important requirement for any bring-your-own-device program is the ability to access corporate data on any device, while also ensuring that the data isn't at risk of theft or exposure. Serious data breaches can cause irreparable damage to a company's reputation, while also putting the company at risk of costly regulatory penalties. It's clear that organizations considering bring your own device have no shortage of reasons to avoid a data breach.
Fortunately, with cloud-based data access, it's entirely possible for them to do so. This is because organizations can build their cloud environment in a way that ensures that even when data is accessed on an employee-owned device, no data is actually stored at the device level; instead, it all remains in a centralized cloud data center, where the appropriate security measures can be employed by experienced professionals. Even if employees are careless with their devices and the way they access data, there's no reason that data should ever be put at risk of exposure.
Access to business apps
Finally, cloud enables the key aspect of anywhere, anytime work: building a seamless experience for employees across all devices. No matter which device an employees chooses to use, they can feel confident that they'll be able to access the business applications they need to do their jobs, and that the user experience with those applications will be much the same as it would on any other devices they might use.
To learn more about how you can enable anywhere, anytime employees—both safely and effectively—register for a FREE RightCloud assessment from Cima Solutions Group today. We'll help you identify what your ideal cloud might look like, and how that cloud environment might play into a bring-your-own-device program like the one described in this post.
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