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I’m probably going to get flamed for this but I’m going to say it anyway - I hate Blackberries! OK, I’ve said it, and I do feel much better for getting it out in the open.
Before you start heading for the reply button, let me explain. I don’t hate Blackberry devices as such, after all they aren’t really any different to look at these days than a modern mobile/smart phone or PDA. What I DO hate is the marketing hype that surrounds them and the inevitable disappointment that ensues when some poor unsuspecting user has been duped into purchasing one for use with their corporate network when they are already running Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 SP2 or above.
In my opinion, company email sent from a mobile device should be treated the same as if you were sitting at a desk in the office using Outlook or sitting at home using Outlook Web Access (OWA). It should be subject to the same company policies and procedures. For instance, the following basics should all be taken for granted:
- ALL email sent from a mobile device should have the same audit trail to follow as email sent from the company LAN.
- ALL email sent from a mobile device should be stored in Exchange & backed up by a brick level process allowing individual emails to be restored.
- ALL email sent from a mobile device should contain the company’s authorised disclaimer, this is particularly important for companies that are regulated by bodies such as the FSA etc. The disclaimer should be automatically attached to the outgoing email and shouldn’t rely on individual “signature” disclaimers on the device itself.
- I should be able to remotely wipe the device of all email should it be lost or stolen to protect my company data.
- On returning to the office, any email sent, calendar items added or contacts changed should be immediately reflected in Outlook without me having to connect the device to the network/workstation and perform a synchronisation.
Can I do any of this with a Blackberry? No, I most certainly can’t! At least not with the Blackberry Internet Services option that is almost invariably sold to the user by the pimply faced youth in the shop. The reality is to get all of the above advantages from the Blackberry you have to purchase the Blackberry Enterprise Server software. It’s about this point in the process the user breaks out in a cold sweat and realises they may have made a rash purchasing decision.
It is true to say that some mobile providers will give away the Enterprise Server software free with 5 or more Blackberry devices, but someone somewhere is still going to have to pay to have the software installed on the Exchange server. More to the point, why introduce more software to Exchange server when all the functionality the user requires is already built in if only they had bought the right type of mobile device in the first place.
Our support guys get calls from users asking us to set up their shiny new Blackberries so often these days we have decided to redress the balance. We have partnered with a mobile telecoms company and trained their sales team in the advantages of mobile 5/6 devices and smart phones like the Nokia E series when connected to an Exchange server. So now rather than just pushing a Blackberry on the user, they ask questions about the users network to see if they can leverage a better ROI out of their existing Exchange infrastructure. This is a great way to increase sales & service revenue both for us and the telecoms company and of course the real winner is the user who gets what he wanted in the first place without having to spend money on network infrastructure unnecessarily.