Want a better employee experience? Give them a choice of devices.

November 2, 2021

What does nearly every single employee touch every day? It’s common, it’s valuable to the organisation, but it is often overlooked. It’s the devices employees use to do their daily work, and they hold a lot of power in the employee experience.

Employees are familiar with how these devices should work – expectations defined by their experiences with their personal devices, whether they are phones, tablets, laptops or desktops. To deliver a more valuable employee experience, organisations should structure their employees’ technology and devices to be more consumer-like, and give them the opportunity to choose the devices they want.

People are an organisation’s most valuable resource. What better way to make the organisation successful than to provide employees choice in the devices they work with, whether familiarity is most important to them or having the latest technology experience is. Whatever the device, one thing is certain: the employee experience should be frictionless. According to Gartner, employees waste 5+ hours weekly when working with technology, and 2 out of 3 employees report they regularly exert too much effort to use the technology their company provides.

Managing and securing employees' devices of choice   

When we take a broad view of employees and their use of devices, the advantages of offering choice are clear. But organisations still raise concerns around choice – security, compatibility, compliance, management and cost – even though these concerns have long been addressed using solutions such as zero-touch deployment and mobile device management for guaranteed consistent configurations. This is where experts can step in and provide businesses with a path to device choice while protecting enterprise security and assets, delivering high economic value and simultaneously increasing employee productivity through the use of familiar and reliable devices.

A primary shift for organisations is to recognize that each type of device requires a distinct approach. Unfortunately, traditional third-party solutions often treat every device the same, even though they are architecturally different. For example, the vertical integration of Apple® devices has more in common with mainframes than commodity, component-based PCs, and yet products have been ported from Windows to macOS® without rethinking the steps needed to align with the realities of the platforms.

So, as enterprises offer device choice, they also need to consider the underlying requirements for management and security. This is where DXC’s experience and expertise can provide your organisation with clarity and alignment.

Benefit from the DXC and Apple partnership

DXC Modern Workplace provides a seamless path to device choice by enabling a secure, personalised employee experience which fosters collaboration and productivity on any device. Our partnership with Apple extends the advantages of choice by enabling you to choose from Apple’s complete device portfolio. By aligning with Apple’s best practices for implementation and ongoing device management, we help alleviate any concerns with consistency around implementation and ongoing device management. And we also deliver substantial savings by eliminating unnecessary products and taking advantage of platform-specific approaches integrated into centralised management and reporting.

What benefits can you expect for your organisation? Studies indicate that providing employees with choice can have a notable impact on hiring and retention. In fact, a recent survey of 2,000 employees and 500 IT decision-makers sponsored by software company Jamf found that 70 percent of respondents said they would be more likely to join a company given technology choice. Even more – 75 percent – said they are more likely to stay with a company that offers such choice.

Choice matters, but doing it well is critical. Start today by asking, “What would keep me from offering choice?” and then work with DXC to assess your concerns and define a clear path to success.

Be a hero to your organisation and offer your employees choice.