Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) is a policy by which organisations allow employees to use their personal devices for work.
Although this option lets employees gain more flexibility in their work and can reduce contact centre costs, the level of adoption is still low due to various privacy and security risks.
David Dungay, Editor in Chief at CX Today welcomed Andrew McNeile, Chief Customer Officer at Thinscale, and Nerys Corfield, contact centre consultant and Director at Injection Consulting, to discuss how contact centres can find a balance between agent demand for flexibility and operational concerns.
Andrew McNeile, Chief Customer Officer at Thinscale, said: “There are two core issues with BYOD, site location and the technology.
“Up until now, I think corporate devices have been a popular solution. They are secure and operate well.
“But the logistical operational and administrative complexities and the fact that you’re creating waste, together with a 30 to 40% of device loss is a massive economic problem. This is why BYOD should be a part of every contact centre offering.”
Still, organisations are not in a hurry to include BYOD as a part of their strategy. The majority are still prioritising their own needs over agents’.
Corfield said: “Operations are now making big decisions in terms of their workforce and where they physically carry out their jobs.
“Whilst a lot are saying they are going to remain 100% home-working, there are others which are looking at hybrid models.
“There is a lot of wrangling about what the mid to long term looks like and what’s the best thing for retaining agents.”
Having their own privacy is a front and center of lots of people’s agendas, says Corfield. Moving to the cloud has created a level of anxiety around keeping data and privacy secure.
Risks Associated with BYOD
The biggest risk associated with BYOD is security. Organisations have been wary of this concept due to data leakages or other malware that can compromise the company.
McNeile: “In the past, secure BYOD would not be possible, because you are connecting to your network something you do not know about.
“The solution is to turn something unknown into something that’s known.”
McNeile names three primary concerns when it comes to privacy, and these are key loggers and screen scrapers, data leakage and malware and viruses being introduced into the main system.
To maintain the level of security, contact centres need to make sure the devices are properly locked down and controlled. This includes things like limiting which websites can be visited or what parts of the screen can be copied and pasted.
