Mobile Workforce Report Q4 2010: Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4 | Page 5 | Page 6 | Page 7
Section 3: Corporate Versus Personal Liability
Since smartphone liability had such a strong effect on mobile worker behavior, we wanted to explore this point further. Although smartphone penetration was highest among those age 44 and younger, corporate issued smartphones were more common among workers over the age of 35. We wanted to see what smartphones mobile employees used and how they used them when they were responsible for purchasing the device.
On the flip side, we also looked at how mobile worker behavior changed at companies that had a stricter smartphone policy. By stricter, we specifically looked at employees who worked for companies that had standardized on only one smartphone operating system. These companies were much more likely to pay for their employees’ smartphones. But we still found that more than one in five mobile employees (21.9 percent) used a smartphone for work outside of the corporate policy.
Behavior with a Personal Smartphone Device
We asked mobile employees if their smartphones were issued by their companies or were a personal device. More than half (53.8 percent) had a smartphone issued by their company and 46.2 percent had a personal device. Interestingly, we found that the older the employee, the more likely the phone was issued by their companies. Only 35.1 percent of the 22 to 34 year-olds received a smartphone from their company, compared to 62.8 percent for those aged 45 to 54. This finding could be related to the mobile user’s role within the organization, as older workers are more likely to be senior in the organization and have a job that includes a corporate-provided device as a perk.
Figure 15: Is your smartphone issued by your company or is it a personal device?
When employees paid for their own smartphones, we noticed that several characteristics changed. We mentioned earlier that they were less likely to use their own smartphones for work, although 66.0 percent did.
Figure 16: Do you use your smartphone for personal reasons, business reason, or both? (Filter: provide own smartphone.)
We also noticed a difference in the top smartphones when the decision was left in the hands of the employee. When workers bought the devices themselves, nearly half (45.7 percent) chose iPhones. The iPhone was the first choice for both work (29.7 percent) and personal use (46.1 percent) among those that purchased their own personal smartphones.
Figure 17: Do you currently use a smartphone for business and/or personal reasons? If so, which one? (Provide own smartphone.)
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Behavior in Companies with Stricter Smartphone Policies
We also asked mobile workers which smartphones their companies had standardized on. More than two-thirds (67.8 percent) of mobile employees reported that their enterprises had standardized on one smartphone operating system, while nearly one-third (32.2 percent) supported multiple smartphone operating systems.
The top three devices that mobile employees reported that their enterprises had standardized on were:
1) The BlackBerry (51.3 percent)
2) The iPhone (20.7 percent)
3) Windows Mobile (12.0 percent)
Figure 18: Has your company standardized on any particular smartphone operating system(s)?
Looking across geographies, BlackBerry remained the top smartphone OS, but there was fluctuation in popularity among companies in Europe and Asia Pac.
Figure 19: Has your company standardized on any particular smartphone operating system(s)? (By geography.)
Companies that had reportedly standardized on a single smartphone operating system were more likely to pay for that smartphone (62.1 percent). However, even in this environment, 21.9 percent of mobile workers used a non-company-standard smartphone for work, and 7.2 percent used a second or third smartphone for work, even though they already had a company-issued one.
This trend may change if companies lighten their smartphone policies in the next year, as many mobile employees expect. The top three devices that mobile employees were expecting their employers to add to their list of standard mobile devices this next year were:
1) The iPhone with 17.6 percent
2) The Android with 13.6 percent
3) Windows Mobile with 6.4 percent
Figure 20: Do you anticipate your company’s smartphone policy (as stated above) changing over the next 12 months? If so, which smartphone(s) do you expect your company to support?
We saw a similar trend across geographies. Mobile employees believed that their companies would adopt the iPhone first, followed by the Android, with broader adoption of the iPhone in Asia Pacific, and wider expected adoption of the Android in Europe.
Figure 21: Do you anticipate your company’s smartphone policy (as stated above) changing over the next 12 months? If so which smartphone(s) do you expect your company to support? (By geography.)
Mobile Workforce Report Q4 2010: Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4 | Page 5 | Page 6 | Page 7
