Enterprise Mobility and the Pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic changed the way we do business, accelerating the (already existing trend) of telecommuting, as businesses “were forced” to have their employees work safely from home. As a result, the role of Enterprise Mobility (EM) was significantly upgraded.

One of the first and most important issues that came up with the recent shift to remote work, was the use of mobile equipment by employees who had never worked from home before. Employers had three options: buy new equipment for their employees, ask them to take their work computers home or use BYOD.

Each of these options came with its challenges, either in terms of logistics, practical or security issues, as cyberattacks have significantly intensified – an issue that particularly concerned mobile users.

Business takeaways

One of the first takeaways is that the very nature of work is changing, as it seems that there will be no particular rush to return to the situation that preceded remote work. In fact, especially for industries such as retail, the changes required to adapt to social distancing were drastic. In addition, there was an increase in contactless transactions, making mobile devices even more important in this respect.

More and more companies are starting to explore Enterprise Mobility, as they move from ad hoc remote work environments to more permanent, “organized” models where employees will work from home for longer periods of time and need better support. And this means they have to find a way to manage their mobile devices and applications.

Lockdowns have also put a spotlight on cloud computing. Those that did not already use the cloud, were forced to try this model in an effort to resolve a series of problems brought on by the pandemic. Nevertheless, as things are gradually improving, it is certain that this shift towards the cloud will continue, with even greater adoption rates.

By the same token, the concept of access has to change, as passwords now seem obsolete. In a world living with COVID, mobile users are working remotely more and more often, and can no longer be expected to type passwords on small on-screen keyboards. Stronger and more convenient access mechanisms based on biometrics, multifactor authentication and context-aware logins are required to make remote work seamless and secure.