The Mobile 2.0 experience is predicated on three essential elements:
1. Simplicity – Ease of use
2. Ubiquity – Anywhere, anytime access
3. Continuity – Business processes must be maintained, if not enhanced
Continuity is critical because the most basic design goal is to extend existing applications to existing devices using existing business processes. It is not acceptable for mobile applications to dictate how businesses operate. In fact, the opposite must be true.
Take the example of the IT outsourcer that supports hundreds of field agents for a large government agency and needed a mobile incident management app for technicians. The outsourcer had spent years developing and refining workflow, ticket routing, approvals, escalations, and SLAs in the underlying IT service management system.
A top priority was making sure the firm didn’t need to recreate or redesign business rules to accommodate the mobile solution. This was an explicit requirement. As a result, the outsourcer now has a system that not only is fully integrated with the existing IT service management application but also improves first-call resolution rate, reduces network downtime, and enables tighter SLAs for critical issues.
Before deploying your mobile solution, consider the elements of your existing workflow that should and should not change, and base your analysis on user behaviors, not on the capabilities of the mobile solution. Document this and refer to it when developing your implementation plan. Having a plan that preserves the integrity of existing workflow and selecting a mobile solution capable of adhering to the plan is the surest way to guarantee user adoption and minimize the risk of project-related cost overruns.
By BMC Software