Speed is the New Business Edge
We’re living in a world where speed matters – everything around us is moving at ever increasing speed no matter what facet of our lives is involved – personal, social and of course, business. The advent of high speed networks combined with go-anywhere mobile devices, including the ubiquitous smart phones and tablet PCs, is empowering business and staff to transact business on the fly, no matter where or when they are.
Higher productivity, greater impact on the business environment, increased flexibility, lower costs, more revenues and enhanced profit.
Everyone should be happy, but there are some drawbacks.
Speeding up how we transact business comes with a price of increasing complexity; the underlying technology must be dealt with which silently hides behind the curtain and makes all of this work. In addition to the need to understand the increasing complexity of the technology is the need to prepare for when things go wrong too – something which is all too frequently forgotten about in the heady rush to cut costs and deliver greater functionality to demanding staffers and partners. The very real challenge is that speed is desirable, but you can wind up running away from your business goals that much faster unless you are steering the power at your fingertips in the right direction.
In short, the problem is how to manage speed effectively.
For many businesses, managed mobility service providers operating on the SaaS (Software as a Service) model are the solution to harnessing the power of mobile devices and usage. Businesses turning to SaaS mobility management providers are finding that they are then able to concentrate resources and management attention to their core business activities rather than worrying about what the technology is and safeguarding against downtime and security issues. Effectively, this is moving business focus away from what “it” is to what “it” can do for their business to make them better and more successful.
The Need for Customization
There is no universal mobile solution for companies, no matter the niche they occupy. Trade show exhibitors in particular must be able to tailor the mobile edge to their own sales processes in order to optimize ROI on the trade show floor. This includes delivering the ability to manage costs, but also providing trade show staff with the ability to access the company’s knowledge base when they need to. i.e. with a customer on the trade show floor; delivery of desktop communication tools while mobile; ability to place orders and generate quotes on the fly; and to deliver security of sensitive customer and proprietal information.
Which Way Do You Turn?
Too much too fast is a recipe for disaster – not even enterprise class companies can effectively manage everything that business speed and mobility is currently delivering. While staff may cry out for mobile capability right now, your first issue is how to implement speed and mobility tools which can always be effectively managed without threat to the company or the bottom line. While a shiny smart phone from Apple or the latest tablet from HP may be highly desirable, you must tailor these demands to how your IT budget can be allocated, and for many companies that budget is already stretched dangerously thin.
Be brutal in what you will implement and make sure you have traditional business processes ready and able to handle operations on the trade show floor should the technology fail.