Cloud computing, mobile, and consumerization of IT are among the biggest technology trends for middle market companies. They come together neatly at one point: apps. And employees and executives love using them. They keep in touch with colleagues, family, and friends with Facebook or Twitter. Or an app like Evernote lets them keep running to-do lists and a place to jot down important thoughts and ideas and have access to them from virtually anywhere.
Apps can help manage travel, document expenses, get discounts, and even connect to critical applications that help run the business. But there are so many that managing how they interact with the company's needs can be mind boggling. An analysis last year by cloud service management vendor Skyhigh Networks of more than 3 million business users across more than 100 companies found 2,204 total apps in use, with the average per organization at 545.
The sheer volume of connections, secured and not, can give a company a headache. Last year, shortly before it was acquired by Intel, the IT department of 170-employee tech company Mashery had a problem: co-mingled data. Employees regularly used apps on their smartphones to share corporate data on such services as Evernote and Skype. "There's only so much you can do to stop people from forwarding an e-mail or storing a document off a phone," Mashery IT executive John Oberon told the New York Times.
If employees use their own devices, they will download what they wish and a company may have no way of preventing it. Mobile device management systems can offer more control over what can happen with company-owned devices. But in either case, you want to identify a manageable set of apps that will offer value to the business. Here is how to approach testing social media, productivity, and other apps. Think of these as a descending series of examinations. An app that fails at a higher level needn't be tested any further down.
Function
The app has to do something that employees at the company need to accomplish. Notice that isn't phrased as what the company needs to accomplish. Employees are the ones with the responsibility to accomplish various tasks. Those tasks may be directly related to business processes, such as entering CRM data during a sales visit or monitoring critical performance metrics on the road. Or the tasks could be indirect activities: making a hotel reservation, checking on flight times, or managing a to-do list.
Each app should have a clear benefit it provides the employee and, therefore, the business. There will be some duplication. For example, chances are you'll want apps from a number of airlines to ensure more flexible travel planning. Employees can tell you the apps they currently find most useful. Research at technology websites can offer other suggestions. Then there are the apps available from your current software vendors that can allow remote access and function. If there isn't a clear-cut benefit offered by an app, it stays off the list.
Suitability
Next, you want the apps to be suitable for your employees and culture. Test them with people from different departments or divisions in the company. These will be subjective reports and it may be that you get mixed reactions. The important thing is to find at least relatively broad support among users that the app works smoothly, is bug-free, and is easy to use.
Compatibility
Once an app has passed through the function and suitability tests, turn it over to IT to check for compatibility with existing systems. Even something from a software vendor needs to prove that it works as advertised and has no disruptive influence on the company's operations. It also means that the app should be available for the major mobile platforms that either the company supports or that employees use. An app only available on an iPhone or Android device is likely to be too limited.
Security
Finally, check security. This is perhaps the trickiest area because it requires the most nuanced look. Many major apps have seen security breaches of various types within the last two years. It may be that you'll need policies restricting some uses of apps. For example, will they be allowed to put any type of company document onto cloud storage, will the company provide its own remote access cloud storage for documents, or will it have to classify documents into different categories and allow different treatment per category? Some apps might pass through all the other stages only to fail this last one.
By using a graduated type of examination, you can more efficiently gather suggestion for apps and evaluate them, saving IT resources that are already pressed for time from having to evaluate products that clearly won't make the grade.
Erik Sherman is an NCMM contributor and author whose work has appeared in such publications as The Wall Street Journal The New York Times Magazine Newsweek, the Financial Times Chief Executive Inc., and Fortune. He also blogs for CBS MoneyWatch. Sherman has extensive experience in corporate communications consulting and is the author or co-author of 10 books. Follow him on Twitter.