Why BYOD Is A Big Opportunity You Can't Miss

By Gary E. Barnett, senior VP and GM, Collaboration Platforms, Avaya

What are some of the specific challenges IT might face in this new BYOD world?

One is: how do you even track BYOD traffic on your network? You’ll have to have some way to know that yet another new consumer-owned device has access to your information, and you’re going to have to make sure that information stays secure.

Also, BYOD will certainly increase traffic. There’s absolutely nothing to keep employees from jumping on the corporate network with their iPhones.

Another thing is that someone could bring his own device and start being malicious on the network, barging into calls and stealing calls. We’re seeing more and more demonstrations of that is where someone can, without anyone knowing, hijack a voice or video call. That’s a real threat to the IT organization.

If BYOD is potentially  troublesome for IT, should businesses avoid it?

No, they shouldn’t. I believe BYOD has high potential for increases in overall productivity. The workers who want to use them in their work are available any time, anywhere. They have a myriad of applications at their disposal. And there are times when a purpose-built device just doesn’t make as much sense as BYOD.