By Doug Bourgeois, VP & Federal Chief Cloud Executive, VMware
The adoption of smart phones, tablets and other mobile devices is proliferating. In rapidly increasing numbers, people are adopting these technologies for use in their everyday lives. In fact, the adoption rates are staggering. It took 21 years for the annual number of PC shipments to top 1 million units. In stark contrast, it took only 4 years for annual tablet shipments to reach the million unit mark. For the first time, the combined number of tablets and smartphones that shipped in 2010 was greater than the number of PCs that shipped in the same year. What does this mean? People are adopting these mobile technologies for convenience in their personal lives and they expect to leverage those same conveniences at work.
With demand growing so rapidly, it’s not surprising that Federal organizations have accepted these devices into the enterprise. A recent survey reported that 99% of Federal employees are using some sort of mobile device to perform their jobs. With ever tightening budgets, Federal agencies are encouraging employees to bring their own devices to work. Sixty-two percent of Federal agencies have a “bring your own device” policy in place, allowing employees to use their own mobile devices at work. Almost half of the Federal workforce is doing just that. But the watchful eyes of the budget hawks are carefully scrutinizing the IT budgets across the Federal landscape. Analysts and the Congress alike are clamoring for investments in IT to increase productivity. When I served as the CIO of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the Congress was relentless in holding agencies accountable for the delivery of productivity gains commensurate with investments in IT. These expectations have only intensified in the current budget climate.
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