Why IT Needs To Change for Gen Z

An anonymous reader writes "Staff will routinely be bringing their own devices to work in five years time, according to IT industry experts in the UK. Some companies might already allow a few iPhones and iPads, but CIOs and businesses are not only going to have to support a general influx of consumer kits — they're going to need to get a whole lot more relaxed in general. 'Big businesses are going to have to become more flexible about how IT is provisioned and managed — to enable a new generation of workers who use consumer technologies to communicate and be productive.'"

Comments

Re:Why Gen Z Needs To Change for Work

[St.Creed]

So your CEO walks in with his new iPhone and wants to access his mobile reporting solution. The one containing all his sales information. You're telling him he can't?
And if the CEO has it, his underlings will have it a few weeks later. They still outrank you. You're going to tell them they can't have it? And when all the managers have it, how long will it be before EVERYONE has access?

Seriously: start preparing, because the tidal wave is coming. It is already happening. 17% of companies now have a "bring-your-own-device" policy in place (a quote from 2 weeks ago by Claudia Imhoff, she spoke at a BI-event I was at). Some provide a choice: company laptop with maintenance or your own device but you do the maintenance. This will grow rapidly.

Philips was migrating to this policy about 5 years ago. Big companies I'm working for are already preparing for that transition. The ones who are not, will find it very hard to satisfy their interal customers. They will also find retainment of new workers a big problem.

Ofcourse this is difficult: it is most difficult for those companies that still have software in place with dedicated clientsoftware, beyond MS Office. Companies (like a few where I worked) that started moving away from that and to webbased apps, are in good position to actually profit from this move.