One of the key phenomena of the last few years has been
the drive to make businesses more agile by adopting flexible
working practices. Yet enabling such a way of working isn't cheap.
All companies are under quite severe financial pressure to cut the
cost of IT and communications (ICT). Yet virtually all companies
like yours who are implementing mobile networks have very clear
ideas as to the extent of their investment. Similarly, you probably
have very clear ideas regarding what benefits that you expect from
setting up a mobile enterprise.
However, according to leading analysts such as Forrester, an
alarmingly growing number of firms are investing in mobile networks
without analysing and assessing precisely the total costs and
benefits involved. For mobile networks to deliver benefit they need
to be implemented and maintained cost effectively cost
effectively. Your board will not allow investments without precise
ideas of what the total costs are and what returns will be made
from the investment. In short, if you wish to reap the benefits
from the mobile enterprise you need not only to implement clear
total cost of ownership (TCO) calculations, you need also to
establish a precise return on investment (ROI).
These things are not so easy to establish. Forrester Research
reported in 2003 that "providing a clear ROI is particularly
difficult in terms of mobile technology. because companies often
don't know how the required technology will affect the business.
Alarmingly, the research company estimates that only one in five of
UK companies investing in mobile technology-and spending on average
£496,000-identified any quantifiable business benefit.
Logically the first step for you to do is to set up a TCO
calculation. You have a number of options here including dedicated
internal personnel resource to the task at hand or engaging outside
consultants. Giving his opinion of the subject Mick Hegarty,
general manager of ICT marketing with BT Business, comments "TCO is
something everyone struggles with, but it's down to common sense,"
says Hegarty. "It shouldn't be complicated for a business because
there are a limited number of costs involved."
There exist a number of tools and methods for calculating TCO
but arguably the most well-known is Gartner Group's methodology.
Put simply, this is a formula for calculating the cost of owning
and operating any type of technology. Gartner's TCO formula groups
all the costs incurred by a technology system into four categories:
capital costs, administrative costs, and technical support and
end-user operations. The headings essential encompass virtually
every cost involved in using ICT from buying the product to
installing, maintaining and supporting it.
From this your company will be able to work out its budget to
covering network connectivity, hardware, software and management.
Yet it is essential also that you realise that TCO does not take
into consideration general business caveats and risk and nor does
it offer any guidance as to the end deliverable. TCO calculations
generally at best please your accountants and CFO. Costs have to be
balanced against return.
And in the case of the mobile enterprise these benefits may be
not overly apparent to those with fiscal control. For example
quantifying how your workers' productivity has changed using mobile
technology can be complicated. This is because in mobility, you
will have to realise the benefits from achieving specific tasks or
satisfying specific business needs.
Judgement calls occur at many stages. For example, with what air
interface do you wish to base your mobile technology? Are the cost
benefits from GSM, for example outweighed by the lack of
functionality that more expensive but more robust alternatives
could offer? What best matches your business need, not the budget?
What are the ramifications in each to the overall project costs in
terms of training and support for mobile systems?
The key to reaping the benefits from mobile technology though
will be for you and your company to look at what mobile technology
best suits your need and then to get the appropriately (trained)
personal to utilise it effectively. And this is the clever bit.
This article was part of Computer Weekly's enterprise mobile
business channel, sponsored by Nokia