We know we’re in the midst of a full hype cycle when we see conferences and blogs dedicated to a technology topic. This month, I am attending my first startup show with Consumerization of IT as the theme — Under the Radar, on April 26, in Mountain View, Calif. There is even an acronym now, CITE or something like that, and of course some hash tags. But, let’s step back. What does the Consumerization of IT really mean?
A few years ago, I heard my friend (and boss at the time) Mark Templeton, CEO at Citrix Systems introduce the term. It was in the context of a Citrix appstore that enables business users to search for and select applications the same way one would on iTunes (and in the context of BYOD). I thought, “well OK this is pretty cool,” and it was a nugget of truth and value. It would be nice to just “find” my business applications at a well-known and trusted place. Mark is a visionary kind of guy and on the leading edge of thinking and messaging. Naturally this instance was no exception. He was ahead of the curve once again, as at that point in time, the popular press equated consumerization/BYOD as a snooze fest.
In the past few years, I have observed a lot of folks trying to define and characterize this thing called consumerization of IT. It is multi-dimensional in nature, and there are aspects for both the end user and the IT Professional.
End users are more and more becoming, or already are, digital natives. They are totally comfortable with technology and expect things to just work. The notion of compromise really doesn’t exist and products need to unfold themselves naturally before users eyes. They are accustomed to “just using something.” None of them read a comparison whitepaper before deciding to use Google or Bing, Zagat or Yelp, Hipmunk or Kayak. It is an instant decision based on results and feel. Likewise, none of these users went to a training class to learn how to buy a book on Amazon. It was intuitive; they did it once, a book appeared, and no credit card fraud occurred. Then repeat and boom; success for Amazon and a new way of purchasing books and other goods was born. I’m definitely not #justsayin. This really is a big deal.
For the IT professional, there is a desire to bring in products and services that mimic their own experience as consumers. It’s easier and less risky, and definitely costs less to get going. What IT professional wants to call the budget folks, to ask for funds, to buy a few servers so they can try out a business application product such as a workforce management system or expense management product? Then there is the time it takes to install software, figure out data protection, keep the application up to date, etc. Yes, custom in-house applications are still need in-house (topic for another post on hybrid cloud) but packaged software? The IT pro just wants to do a little research, cruise over to a SaaS website and start trying the application. If they like the application, they pop in their credit card number and boom they are a customer. If they don’t like the application, they let the trial expire. No capital is spent and no wasted time on infrastructure aspects that don’t matter. A subtle note here is that the IT pro probably never talked to the product’s publisher or worried about the size of the company that made the application. The user based his/her decision on utility, quality, word of mouth credibility, and voice (like on Twitter) of the producer. It’s no longer about the size of the sales force or the D&B rating. Its all self-service, and there is the growing phenomenon that users are adopting technology from much smaller outfits than ever before.
The consumerization trend is here to stay. It doesn’t mean that all applications move offsite. It does mean that the products that are on premises and off premises, application or infrastructure, need to adapt and enable agility and frictionless deployment. And, one last point; applications better be accessible from a smartphone. Think differently, said my friend Mark. It’s nice to see consumerization and BYOD) happening widely now.
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frankartale posted this
