Users Want One Phone For Personal And BusinessUsers Want One Phone For Personal And Business

Now that cell phones have morphed into mini-computing devices, people are putting a lot more in them than just a few cell phone numbers. Now they have hundreds if not thousands of contacts, all of our appointments, tasks, a sizable chunk of our music library, pictures and maybe even a few DVDs that have been ripped to watch during a flight. Trying to keep a personal and work phone up to date with critical information has just about become impossible, leaving many to just go for a single device for both business and home usage.BusinessWeek has an article that claims the business phone is dead. They cite both Microsoft and Nokia, both of which recognize that work and personal lives blend and the user should have a device that accommodates both worlds. I have to agree with this line of thinking. I've never had two cell phones. Even when my phone only held the contacts I could tap in, I didn't want to maintain two devices. I have been fortunate to work for a number of companies that allowed me to keep my existing device. My trade off has always been it is my phone so it is my cost. I only asked the company to reimburse me for cost over and above my normal plan, such as roaming charges, long conference calls that took me over my minutes, or excessive emails running up data charges - this in the day before the cheap all-you-can-eat plans that we have today. Over the years, this has been an enormous time saver for me. All of my contacts and emails, from various accounts, always at my fingertips. I can review spreadsheets while waiting at the doctor's office and read ebooks while waiting for the plane to board. I know when personal events will cut a workday short and when I need to keep a weekend clear of family events for a big project at the office, all from the same device. This brings up a challenge though to many IT departments. Some companies simply cannot have the security risk if they deal with sensitive information, such as health records, government contracts or banking information. For many of us though, our jobs are not so confidential that you can't get enough comfort by having the phone password protected. Now you have to worry about what is being installed on the phone though, and what that may bring back into the enterprise. These devices are constantly syncing with the server or are docked with a PC to exchange information. While I think the risk of a phone getting a virus is slim, getting a virus on your network when a user uses a phone to move programs from their home PC to their work PC is a real threat. And while you likely won't get a virus on the phone, some users may clutter it with so many apps that it fails to perform its most basic needs. Some users do that with their PCs already. There is no doubt the current crop of smartphones can handle both your work and personal lives. Many have been able to do that for a few years. The question now is, how does the enterprise incorporate this line of thinking into their security practices, keeping the network and the data on it secure while allowing them the freedom to load a few extra programs for personal enjoyment on their devices?