The spread of consumer technology is a much greater influence on people's behavior and preferences than their experience in the workplace. This is why the topic of BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) causes headaches for businesses. People want to use their own smartphones and tablets for work purposes – and why not? They don't want to break security, they just want the ease of use and flexibility that comes with using their own equipment. As our personal lives evolve in line with our use of technology, so we want to change the way we work.
Now that the good old “user” is actually the driver of IT, IT teams are working hard to reconcile the demand for flexibility with the needs of security and control. This is hard. But the bigger picture is all good. When you consider what this shift in leadership can do for our organizations, the benefits are huge.
First, and perhaps most trivial, is that support is shrinking. People teach themselves to use apps. They find apps themselves. They configure them themselves. They update them themselves.
Second, and more profound, is that ideas about exploiting information and connectivity are starting to come from ordinary people rather than appointed managers or visionaries. “Wouldn't it be cool if...” Everyone can now be a player in the world of collaborative IT.
Third, there's the impact on strategy. The generation coming through won't see data governance, and data standards, as an esoteric, technical issue. They'll say: “My car can't talk to my house – that's crazy!” and fix it. Better still, they'll say: “Wouldn't it be crazy if my car couldn't talk to my house? Well, how come my business systems can't talk to yours?” Likewise, they won't have any time for data lock-in – every cloud will have to enable data withdrawal, so standards will be essential. There will simply be no argument for non-standard approaches.
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