Choose Carefully When Selecting a Mobile Platform

As agencies implement the Obama administration’s 21^st Century Digital Government Strategy, a fundamental decision they face will be which platform or device to develop. In some cases, the decision will be obvious, as citizen-facing apps need to operate in a heterogeneous environment. The same is true for personal productivity apps deployed as part of any bring your own device workplace initiative.

In general, agencies interested in customizing devices, such as the Defense Department, have gravitated towards the Android platform. Those agencies more concerned about out-of-the-box usability and cost-of-ownership issues have tended to favor the Apple iOS. And most agencies are keeping an open eye towards Microsoft Windows 8 due to its promise for creating an integrated desktop across multiple platforms. But we are still early in the game so these preliminary trends should be treated with caution.

Another option is to use browser-based HTML5 applications as they are compatible with multiple devices. This is a good solution for broad audiences, particularly for occasional users, such as citizens or temporary workers. The downside to HTML5 apps is that they tend to lack the richness and performance of the dedicated, device-specific applications users often prefer.

Mobile Enterprise Application Platform solutions fill a similar niche, helping users transform their core software code into device-specific applications for multiple platforms.  While this is a great idea, our experience has found that it’s not (yet) as seamless as one would hope with configuration requirements eating into potential savings.    

In reality, the cost and time required to design the app and create the needed mobile interfaces for existing enterprise systems is often higher than the device-specific programming, testing and configuration. This means that the cost of creating additional dedicated apps for multiple platforms isn’t as high.

Creating a Sustainable Support Model

One of the biggest decisions agencies face is how will they institutionalize and sustain mobility initiatives for their workforces. A secure, scalable and transparent approach is needed to manage devices employees use to access enterprise systems and networks. Complicating factors include the rapid refresh cycles for many devices as well as user expectations for frequent enhancements. 

Key components of an enterprise mobile infrastructure include:

• Virtual Private Network. Almost by definition, employees will use smartphones and tablets outside of the enterprise and will need a secure means to log into key enterprise systems.  Fortunately, the agency’s existing VPN can often support these requirements.
• Network Access. Providing localized connectivity via an integrated Wi-Fi network can improve performance, enhance security and reduce carrier costs. However, these more mobile devices can place greater and unexpected demands on your existing network, so it’s important to assess predicted coverage patterns beforehand. Recognizing that no network can guarantee 100 percent coverage and accessibility, agencies should ensure that these devices can operate independently of the network wherever possible and make provisions to synchronize data automatically to maintain its integrity.
• Mobile Device Management. An automated approach to managing the thousands of mobile devices operating within an agency is an absolute must. An MDM platform addresses important security requirements, including auditing, policy enforcement and remote lock-and-wipe capabilities for lost or stolen devices. It also helps manage and maintain these devices as it provides automated asset management, patch maintenance and remote configuration capabilities. 
• Enterprise Mobile Application Store. Agencies often implement an in-house app store to serve employees. In many cases, this functionality is offered by the existing platform. Managing both internally-developed and commercial applications, these app stores ensure that the right app is delivered to every device based on the user’s specific role and responsibilities.  This centralized approach can be used to control access to sensitive data, manage application procurement and maintain compliance with licensing restrictions.  It also supports quality assurance as upgrades and fixes can be more quickly and easily implemented.

Adopting mobile technology isn’t simply a one-off project. Rather, it is an entirely new channel or domain that needs to be continuously supported and enhanced. And with half of Internet traffic migrating to these new devices, Web content management and application development groups will need to be restructured to meets these new demands. 

Plan for the Unexpected

Maintaining an adaptive approach is key to ensuring long-term success. For example, there has been significant focus on the potential for bring your own device strategies within government. BYOD promises to eliminate the two-device syndrome where government workers carry both a personal smartphone and a government-issued BlackBerry. In terms of OMB’s earlier guidance against issuing employees complementary devices, one can also envision many volunteering to bring in their own tablets to supplement their existing laptop. 

The good news is that supporting employee-owned devices technically is not an insurmountable challenge. Most mobile device management solutions can be easily configured to manage, monitor and audit these devices alongside government-owned models.

The real challenge is with BYOD’s policy implications. By using your personal device to access government systems and potentially store government data, you are making it subject to government policies and restrictions. If the device is lost or stolen, your agency may elect to wipe all of its data, including your personal information. Likewise, this personal data is also potentially subject to legal discovery.

These scenarios point to a related records management challenge because any data created by the device may be subject to a variety of preservation and cataloguing requirements as government-owned data.

Ultimately, you can expect that the 21^st Century Digital Government Strategy will resolve many of the outstanding issues relating to mobile adoption. At the same time, it sets clear expectation that agencies will expose systems and data to mobile devices, beginning immediately with two high-value, customer-facing services over the next year. We have found that this type pragmatic approach -- creating apps to meet targeted, real-world requirements -- is the most effective model for taking your program and agency mobile.

Tim Hoechst is the chief technology officer of Agilex, where he leads the company’s Technology Innovation Center, a research and product development organization. He previously wrote about five ways mobile technology can benefit your mission and how to build apps your kids would be proud to use.