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Mobile Device Management (MDM) continues to be a popular trend in the IT and telecom industries. However, many organizations are still on the fence about this practice due to confusion about implementation and controversy over whether or not it serves a critical purpose.
In order to point you in the right direction, we’ve debunked some common myths and misunderstandings regarding MDM.
Myth 1: MDM Is “Plug and Play”
Many organizations that are new to MDM tend to believe that it’s simply an application that they can install to begin mastering their data. This simply isn’t true. Veteran users of the technology know that MDM creates processes that may or may not have existed in a company. Data won’t be mastered by simply adding a one-size-fits-all solution; someone will need to create procedures and policies to govern datapoints. Not only does this require time, but it’s different for every enterprise because each has different processes, requirements, and methods for doing things.
Myth 2: Data Quality Is Secondary to MDM’s Success
A lot of organizations implement an MDM strategy feeling confident about the quality of data across their systems. Then, they test the waters and discover that data quality is lacking. This typically happens because datasets are constantly evolving, and real-time shifts tend to infuse inconsistencies. In addition, data quality rules are created keeping current business needs in mind, which makes it difficult to maintain or arrive at a state where data is of a certain quality. The solution? Organizations should try addressing crucial discrepancies in data sets stored in different systems. For example, you can standardize the way you define file names across data-based applications to minimize the separation of data records.
Myth 3: We Don’t Require MDM Because We Have an ERP in Place
Organizations using an ERP often think they don’t need to invest in an additional solution to master enterprise data. That is a mistake because most ERP solutions don’t have the ability to offer best practice MDM processes. They usually lack the features to easily insert attributes to support corporate level needs without bringing IT into play. Some ERP solutions also lack data governance support, including audit trails, data security and mature business rule validations. Sometimes, data maintenance can also get difficult due to missing workflows that facilitate cross-department collaboration on data approval, review and enrichment. MDM solutions can address most of these issues as audit trails and flexible workflows are just a couple of subsets of master data management. In fact, implementing MDM may also help you scale from a standalone ERP solution to multiple applications throughout the organization.
Myth 4: MDM Is Similar to a Data Warehouse
Data management experts dealing with data warehouses will often state that there are similarities between the dimensions of a data warehouse and the basic concept of master data domains. While this is true to some extent, MDM offers much more than an array of dimensions to organize and categorize your transactional data. In contrast, a data warehouse is regularly segregated from the systems where its data is sourced. Moreover, MDM solutions reside in their own hubs and offer a set of functions by which analytical and operational software – including applications residing in a data warehouse – can connect to master data, thereby eliminating information silos and data-related inconsistencies.
Myth 5: MDM Is an IT-Specific Initiative
Associating all MDM processes with IT is common in some organizations. After all, the implementation involves both software and data systems. But while the IT department is one of the major users of MDM, the overall implementation is also about resolving certain business issues. When MDM is assigned to IT, business users tend to take less interest. This means that even though MDM is implemented, the business needs of an organization may not be completely addressed, resulting in low adoption and poor MDM use. A better approach is to make the MDM program fully central, where it’s overseen by a designated group and implemented by a cross-function team that consists of a person from each department across the enterprise.
Myth 6: MDM Itself Resolves All the Operational Aspects of Enterprise Mobility
Many enterprises today are struggling to support the increasing rate of BYOD devices, and the majority of them believe that MDM is the silver bullet that can help them get a handle on things. While MDM solutions do address the technical aspects of enterprise mobility – such as securing or the configuration of devices – operations still remain an open challenge.
Without streamlined processes and planning, mobile resolution time rises, demanding the complete utilization of high-cost engineers. This is wherebrightfin’s ServiceNow integration can help. Our certified ServiceNow integration enables leading organizations to incorporate MDM into their enterprise IT infrastructure and asset management processes where they can offer support to users within the same interface. This helps deliver a single hub of record for IT, which offers a single-pane view of asset, mobile, and wireless management expense information.
Hopefully, busting these MDM myths will enable you to set the right expectations with your IT team and personnel. Smart organizations will tie the program’s objectives more closely with their business objectives, which is key to increasing the odds of master data management’s success.