Mobile applications are a necessity in every organization today, we seldom see corporate professionals accessing applications on their personal computers. Almost everyone possesses a mobile device and they are practically working on their smartphones and tablets most of the time.
Today, there is a mobile application for everything that your business needs, according to Buildfire, there are 2.8 million apps available for download on the Google Play Store!
You have productivity apps such as Outlook so you can send e-mails from your mobile phone within seconds, you can check the progress of the projects via project management apps such as Slack, Trello or conduct your social media marketing activities at ease.
The influx of mobile devices in the corporate world is so much that most organizations are promoting and encouraging the “Bring Your Own Device (BYOD)” culture. Employees are free to bring their own devices and use it for business purposes. However, it is imperative to manage, secure and enable IT controls on the devices.
So, let’s understand Mobile Application Management at a granular level – What is MAM, how it works and why it will certainly work for your organization.
What is Mobile Application Management?
Mobile Application Management, also known as MAM, is a software that allows IT administrators to implement corporate policies on the users’ BYOD and corporate mobile devices.
For instance, an employee uses the Salesforce mobile app on his smartphone along with other social media apps such as Facebook and WhatsApp. There is a database he has on Salesforce if the corporate policies are not enforced on Salesforce mobile app, chances are this database may be exposed due to unauthorized access or it may be mistakenly shared over the social media applications that do not have any IT controls, this may affect your organization adversely.
Therefore, Mobile Application Management helps you monitor and secure the vital corporate data and restricts it from being shared unnecessarily
Now that you have a fair idea about Mobile Application Management, you may want to understand how MAM works and is implemented.
How does Mobile Application Management work?
The approach to Mobile Application Management (MAM) can differ from organization to organization. The following are some of the ways an enterprise can implement MAM;
1.Application Wrapping
The applications you use are given an additional code that enables IT administrators to monitor the applications, govern the data being shared and protect them from threats and unauthorized access.
2.Application Sandboxing
Put simply, Application sandboxing means isolating the critical business applications from other applications that you typically don’t use for business purposes. Your privilege to use the application is limited to its utility only.
For instance; you are a marketing professional, using mobile marketing applications such as HubSpot and Hootsuite and applications such as Netflix and Amazon for your personal use on your mobile device, a UID (unique user ID) is assigned to HubSpot and Hootsuite to isolate them from other applications.
This clearly defines the purpose of the application; mobile apps meant for work cannot be accessed for personal use and vice-versa.
3.Using MDM protocols
Many people get confused between MAM and MDM (mobile device management). While MAM means enforcing corporate policies on only the applications, MDM means the policies are enforced on the entire device; monitoring what is being accessed and shared on the device and not just restricted to the applications.
You may also want to consider Gartner’s Market Guide for Mobile Application Management to help you deploy efficient Mobile Application Management in your organization.
Benefits of Mobile Application Management
If you still haven’t inculcated efficient Mobile Application Management within your organization, it’s about time you do so now, here’s why;
- Improved security
The main objective of MAM is to provide security to the applications being used on mobile devices. You may use App wrapping, App sandboxing, MDM protocols or any other approaches, but ultimately the data is protected, irrespective of the device ownership.
- User’s privacy Protection
While the business applications on their mobile devices are always monitored, their private data on the same device is safe and never comes under the scanner. The process of segregating personal applications and enforcing IT controls only on the business application is the crux of MAM. So, the employees are assured about the privacy of their personal data.
- Adopting mobility
When the concern of mobile application security is taken care of by MAM, there is no reason why companies should forbid their employees from using their own devices or provide a corporate mobile device.
The user no longer must drive his way back to the office in case of urgent tasks. He now has a mobile device; almost every issue can get solved from any location; this encourages more and more organizations to adopt mobility.
- More work is done in less time
One device, all applications sorted and secure, and having user privacy – this can be leveraged to enhance the overall productivity significantly. MAM organizes the applications and the policies are clear to the user, when the process is in place it is easier to get a lot more work done in lesser time.
We live in an age where people are becoming tech-savvy, using mobile applications for business effortlessly and making their lives a lot simpler, however, this certainly paves to some potential cyber-attacks if the mobile applications are not secure and protected.
All in all, while embracing the BYOD culture is great, it certainly is viable to have a good Mobile Application Management in place.
Drop-in a line at [email protected] and let us know how you’ve set Mobile Application Management for your organization.
