Productivity And Security Don't Have To Be Inversely Proportional

By James Brown, Chief Architect, JumpCloud

Conventional wisdom in the security industry says that as security is increased, productivity decreases proportionately. Everyone’s experienced it. Access to a certain application or server is denied unless the user is within the confines of the organization. Employees are required to log in to a virtual private network (VPN) when working remotely in order to access key corporate IT assets. New IT purchases need to go through a security screening, delaying the purchase process, and at the same time, users are bombarded with cautionary emails from IT to lock their computers, use better passwords, not connect to public hotspots, encrypt their hard drives, and more. It becomes overwhelming for even technical personnel.

Users today are savvier about security requirements, but are increasingly less tolerant of IT making their jobs harder. Today’s workforce is moving fast and leveraging whatever tools and resources needed to get the job done. Employees and contractors are signing up for services like AWS, Heroku, and thousands of others, and they have no hesitation about placing their corporate assets into these services without IT’s authorization or assistance. Those shadow IT assets serve as short cuts to complete tasks more quickly and there is little regard for corporate security controls or protection of digital assets.

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