Ignore consumer tech at your peril, CIOs warned

Businesses must embrace the 'consumerisation' of technology and not ban staff from downloading or using new technologies and software at work.

Analyst Gartner has warned that technologies such as wikis and those offered by Google and Skype will increasingly find their way into the enterprise, and CIOs and IT directors will not be able to stop the trend by simply banning or ignoring them.

The majority of new technologies which businesses adopt between 2007 and 2012 will have their roots in the consumer market, according to Gartner.

David Smith, VP and Gartner Fellow, said consumers are now more tech-literate and less willing to be limited by the traditional confines of corporate IT.

He said in a statement: "A primary agent of this phenomenon is the second internet revolution in which the internet serves as a proving ground for new technologies. The internet's ease of use has made people view technology differently, with less hesitancy."

Gartner warned these new technologies will find their way into the enterprise whether CIOs like it or not and that, instead of trying to ban them, CIOs should experiment to find ways the business can get productivity gains and competitive advantage from them.

This includes creating "experimentation zones" where IT staff and other users can become familiar with new consumer technologies and identify possible uses in the enterprise to aid collaboration and efficiency.

Gartner also said the potential security threat of new consumer-based technologies in the enterprise also needs to be addressed. silicon.com's CIO Jury IT user panel recently slammed Google's new desktop search tool because of the security risk it poses.

But Smith said businesses need to recognise the 'consumerisation of IT' trend will continue to gain momentum.

He said: "It isn't a fad that's going to go away next year. Don't try to stop it - you will fail."