I’m sure you’ve heard the saying, “a company’s greatest asset is their employees.” However, they can only be your greatest asset when they have the tools they need to be successful. For this, and many other reasons, many enterprises are offering Apple® products to their employees.
The best enterprise leaders know that the key to improving employee productivity and efficiency is making it as easy as possible for their staff to do their jobs. When it comes to IT, that means offering the best user experience with consistent performance and ensuring the resources users need are always available.
When we talk about Mac® in the workplace, many typecast the typical corporate Mac user as someone working in marketing or creative departments. Let’s start out with a couple of statistics from the 2019 Global Survey of Mac Users. The purpose of the study was to determine the key drivers of Mac adoption within enterprises today. The one thing in common amongst all survey participants was that they used a Mac at work. Participants held multiple job roles working for companies of all sizes and industry sectors. Here are a few of the findings:
In today’s digital world, the technology you deploy in the enterprise can make or break the productivity of your business. The blending of work life and home life is becoming more intertwined, and users wants to be able to do the best version of their work on the devices in which they feel most comfortable using. This growing popularity and favoritism of Apple® products really isn’t new per se, but there’s been an influx of questions from IT professionals regarding the best strategies for integration and management of Mac, iPhone, and iPad in their established IT environment.
“One more thing.” It became the immortal catchphrase made famous by Steve Jobs. It became a regular mantra that framed his announcements to the world when he was unveiling a new Apple product or idea that he felt would add value. He first used it in 2001 and Apple has used it intermediately ever since. Last week, Tim Cook used the company’s historical catchphrase to spotlight a series of announcements concerning new products and innovations for the company. The event may have been called “one more thing,” but was actually a number of “one more things” that we think enterprises should be excited about. Here is a short summary of what was announced during the event.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’re probably aware of the recent updates to iOS and iPadOS. IT teams who are supporting workforces that utilize Apple technology should be keeping iOS and iPadOS 14 top of mind while administering networks and attending to employee technology needs.
Apple has a product to suit all aspects of your life with a platform that supports apps for your hobbies and entertainment, storage for your memorable photos and videos, and everything in between, including work. If you think about it, Apple® is your ‘digital workplace’ and companies large and small recognize the benefits of extending Apple products across their business and making them available to employees. Your employees desire flexibility and the option to work anytime from anywhere from the devices that they prefer. With freedom of choice, employees have more control over their work experience, resulting in higher job satisfaction and increased productivity. Enterprises report that the majority of their staff members prefer Apple devices.
When it comes to employee productivity, few things are as beneficial as allowing each user to choose the tools that work best for them. For IT, this means creating an environment that allows employees to pick their preferred OS platform. When given the choice, many users will choose a Mac.
As the need and desire for flexible working environments has grown, IT teams are increasingly turning towards equipment that offers advantages in the digital workplace. These products offer simplified deployment and management, in addition to interconnectivity between devices and other productivity benefits.
In part of one this two-part blog series, we discussed the recent study by Forrester Research outlining the economic impact of Macs in the enterprise. The study showed that while the initial purchase price of a Mac is $500 more than a comparable PC, its true cost is actually $50.25 less over a 3-year product cycle once hardware and software costs are accounted for. The disparity in costs is even more pronounced once supporting costs such as provisioning, deployment, help desk tickets and energy are factored in. Forrester found the resulting cost savings to be $678.56. In the end, TCO matters far more than the initial price tag.
