Why You Need More than MDM to Succeed in 2021

This year, we saw many changes in the mobile device management (MDM) landscape and in-house at Addigy. As we’ve all learned fast lessons about productivity and what our teams need to be successful in a fully remote environment, new opportunities for growth have come to the fore – and some of our longstanding theses have been proven out.

The biggest hunch we’ve had here at Addigy is that it truly takes more than just an MDM solution to support the Apple devices (and the data they hold) in a remote or hybrid-remote environment.

With heightened security risks and an increasingly remote workforce, Addigy and the companies we support are all looking for ways to do more and better in the year ahead. Here’s what you need to know about the limits of standalone MDM solutions for supporting the new line Apple devices and why we deliver more.

A Flexible, Remote Workforce Will Continue to Push Device Security to the Fore 

For businesses of all sizes, the arrival of this pandemic marked the end of perimeter-based thinking about enterprise security, and it’s clear this shift doesn’t mark a temporary change in habits. We can expect that much of the workforce will continue to work at least part-time remotely for the majority of 2021 and beyond, as public health officials work to get the virus under control and organizations redraw their remote work policies for a more flexible future.

The old perimeter, which was the office network, has been reduced to individual computers, and companies must continue to improve device security for all their users – including those Apple devices still flying under your radar.

While basic MDM solutions are good for establishing a self-service portal for end users, they don’t provide the security controls businesses need to protect the only portal employees have for productivity.

In the year ahead, you need to have an MDM solution in place and the agent-based tools to execute remote monitoring management. This is perhaps particularly to ensure that antiviral and anti-malware software is installed and operational on every enrolled Apple device your employees depend on.

The Mac Computer Will Continue to Be the Workhorse of 2021

It’s not news that the Mac computer is the workhorse of small, medium, and enterprise environments, and this will continue to be the case in the year ahead. People don’t log into their work account on their iPad or their iPhone to write an email in their home office – they open their laptop or turn on their monitor and get to work.

That’s why it doesn’t make sense to have just an MDM solution that’s tailored to mobile device management. Laptops are portable – no question – but their capabilities for the business environment go miles beyond what end users do on their smartphones day-to-day.

Your Apple end users are working on Mac computers, and they need the support of an Apple device management solution that wasn’t just designed for troubleshooting issues on tablets. Addigy’s platform was designed with personal computers in mind, and it’s been tailored to the needs of Mac users in business environments, which is part of what makes Addigy a great choice for Windows admins that are new to supporting Apple devices.

You Need More than MDM Solutions to Manage the Next Generation of Mac Computers

If you’ve been following Apple’s fall 2020 announcements, you already know that the M1 chip is a harbinger of a faster, better future for Apple device users at work and at home. Together with Big Sur, we’re about to see the foundations of the next generation of computers enter the market.

Now that Apple’s engineers are untethered from the constraints of IBM’s chips, the capability, speed, and battery life of Mac computers is about to send them to the top of the list of popular devices for professionals.

An MDM solution doesn’t have the ability to do what businesses need to secure their devices on its own. While straightforward device enrollment and deployment is critical to remote operations and identity management, that is just the baseline of the level of support Apple end users expect. You also need to establish:

• Real-time visibility into everything from battery performance to user activity for total security.
• Control and access to ensure that you can deploy patches, assist remote users, and monitor risks.
• Scalable maintenance through a live terminal. More than anything else, you need an Apple device management solution that functions seamlessly at scale, so that your IT admins and consultants don’t have to juggle logins and toggle screens to locate and identify account facts.

With Addigy’s platform, IT administrators have all the tools they need to ensure that employees are logging in through the right utilities and gives them the self-service capabilities they need to troubleshoot their own questions.

Next Year Matters: Make a Difference with the Right Apple Device Management Tools at Your Organization.

Well-organized Apple device management drives efficiency, and Addigy’s platform was designed to help single organization and managed service providers keep their clients humming along without a hitch.

As we look toward 2021 and a new line of faster, higher-performing Mac computers, IT teams must prepare to deliver remote support that matches the high productivity their high impact users expect.