Which mobile apps for business should I deploy first?

The first phase of enterprise mobile application deployment usually occurs in the first year or so of initiating a mobile strategy. It involves giving employees basic productivity capabilities, such as access to their corporate email accounts. Most enterprise mobility management tools have email, calendar and contacts apps, which improve communication by letting workers connect to their corporate data from anywhere.

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Once admins have provided users with basic apps, IT should consider deploying more complex enterprise mobile apps.

Also in that first productivity phase, IT needs to empower the workforce to connect their devices to company data using VPN clients such as Cisco AnyConnect or Juniper Pulse. Using a remote desktop client on mobile devices lets workers access all the files they have on their desktops.

Once admins have provided users with basic mobile apps for business, IT should consider deploying more complex enterprise mobile apps for communications, file sharing and more. Those second-phase apps could include:

• Note-taking apps;
• Contact apps such as an employee directory;
• Social media and messaging apps -- Yammer, Slack;
• File sharing and storage apps such as Box, Dropbox or Sharefile; and
• Conferencing apps such as WebEx.

In terms of note-taking apps, some organizations might want to use out-of-the-box tools or create their own. IT could enable third-party apps such as Evernote, Notability or others available in public app stores.

In the third and final phase of enterprise app deployment, IT should consider deploying customer-facing apps. Those mobile apps for business can be anything that helps improve business processes, provides easier access to data or inventory information and provides an extension of the company's existing website experience.