It’s hard enough getting your employees to stay motivated and on task at work without having to compete with social apps that tend to encourage procrastination. While your employee’s intention may have honestly been to “just check Facebook for a quick second,” often times, before they know it, hours of their afternoon have passed and they’re 16 photo albums deep in their best friend’s profile page.
However, allowing social apps in the workplace can often be dangerous, and not just in the sense that work motivation may be lost. If you are a company that utilizes an enterprise mobile app to streamline your work processes, you may also be risking the safety and security of your company each time one of your employees uses a social app alongside your enterprise mobile app.
To help you learn more about whether or not you should consider blocking social apps in the workplace when your enterprise mobile apps are in use, here are a few pros and cons from each side of the fence.
Cons of Blocking Social Apps
Let’s face it, in the current age of technology, social apps are often just as integrated into the workplace as devices such as computers, fax machines, printers, etc. Especially if you are involved in an industry of sharing such as marketing, online media, communications, PR, etc., or you simply have a communications and marketing department, social apps are a necessity for carrying out your daily tasks. Therefore, it just may not make sense to do away with these apps during work hours.
Another advantage of using social apps in your day-to-day work routine is that many social apps are now used to drive productivity and streamline complicated work processes, rather than hinder them. For instance, social tools like Google Hangouts or Skype can be used as social collaboration tools that businesses use to simplify their daily practices.
Pros of Blocking Social Apps
For companies who have enterprise mobile apps, allowing employees to freely use social apps on their mobile device alongside enterprise apps can be extremely risky. All it takes is one slip of the finger or wrong press of a button to send confidential, imperative company information out to one of your employee’s social networks.
Just imagine it―an employee copy and pastes details of a classified client contract to send over to a fellow employee through your enterprise mobile app, only to accidentally post it on their Facebook or LinkedIn wall instead because the wrong app was open. While situations like this are almost always accidental and rare, is this really something you are willing to risk?
Another pro that comes with blocking social apps while your enterprise mobile app is in use is that you get an added level of security against potential viruses and malware that may be lurking in these outside apps. While many enterprise mobile apps are designed with security as a top priority primarily to protect against these situations, not all security or antivirus protection programs can access every corner of your employee’s devices. Therefore, it’s better to be safe than sorry and block social apps from infecting your company’s enterprise mobile app.
At 7T, security is one of our top considerations for any mobile app or custom software development project. Our team offers a STAX framework with 4096-bit SSL encryption, combined with our Brigade messaging and security platform for maximum security. We also offer security consulting and testing services. To discuss mobile security or a new development project, contact the team at 7T today.
Based in Dallas, 7T maintains regional offices located in Chicago and Houston. To discuss your development project, reach out to the team today!
