VMware Going 'All In' with BYOD

11.05.2012
In most bring-your-own-device plans, employees are the ones bugging management and IT to support their personal devices for work. But VMware took a much different tack when launching its BYOD program late last year: All 6,000 employees in the U.S. must use their personal smartphones for work.

VMware adopted an aggressive 90-day window for employees to make the transition, which included a looming cut-off date when company-owned smartphones would stop working. "We went all-in" with BYOD for phones, says VMware CIO Mark Egan.

VMware's big bet on BYOD was far from a sure thing. Egan had to rely on a new-fangled enterprise social network to quell employee anger over having to spend their own money on something VMware used to pay for. Egan was also hoping to save money with BYOD, a return on investment that often backfires.

Today, Egan says his goals have been met. But even he is quick to point out that this is only the first stage of his BYOD journey. He went after BYOD smartphones first. Now he plans to expand BYOD this quarter to include laptops and tablets, and so he's wrestling with an entirely new class of complex issues.

But Egan is used to pressure. It was pressure that brought BYOD to VMware in the first place.

The Big, Bad BYOD Mandate