Giving Employees A Choice Between Mac And PC Improves Satisfaction: Survey

The recent survey, contracted by Apple device management software vendor Jamf, finds evidence for improved employee productivity and engagement from providing Macs.

While many workplaces continue to only offer PCs to their employees, a new survey suggests a growing number of reasons for businesses to offer a choice between PCs and Apple's Macs.

Jamf, maker of popular Apple device management software products including Jamf Pro, contracted the survey of 1,285 Mac users working in a range of business sizes, from small to large enterprises. The survey found that 79 percent of respondents reported they couldn't do their job as effectively without a Mac.

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Meanwhile, 97 percent of survey respondents claimed increased productivity from using a Mac and 95 percent of respondents attributed increased creativity to their Mac usage.

Insight, No. 14 on 2019 CRN Solution Provider 500, is seeing "exponential growth" in Mac adoption among its customers due to many of the reasons cited in the survey, said Evan Tomlin, director of solutions architecture for connected workforce at Insight.

"We find that there is a growing recognition at the senior leadership level in our customer base that employee experience and productivity have major business implications," Tomlin said in an emailed statement to CRN. "Offering Mac as a choice is a great opportunity for companies to make a relatively minor investment and yet generate an outcome that makes a major difference in helping employees thrive in their work environment."

Ultimately, offering employees a choice between Mac and PC "absolutely drives satisfaction and confidence, and generates a more natural flow of productivity and innovation," he said.

Jamf collaborated on the survey with Apple itself, which is continuing its push to capture more commercial business, including through refreshing most of its Mac lineup over the past year. The survey was conducted by third-party market research firm Vanson Bourne.

For those survey respondents who'd previously used a PC for work, 74 percent reported having fewer computer issues from using a Mac.

“Fewer IT issues are likely the result of deploying Mac, but great care should be taken to integrate it properly within a given IT environment," Tomlin said. "In fact, we encourage our customers to choose the right deployment and support model for Mac — both to help employees have a frictionless experience and to ensure that IT staff are enabled to treat Macs as an 'equal citizen' with other endpoints under their care."

The survey of Mac users included respondents across numerous departments including IT, human resources, marketing, engineering, sales, business development and finance. The results are "a call to arms for enterprises and businesses to offer choice," said Jamf chief marketing officer Dave Alampi in an interview with CRN.

The survey is a follow-up to a Jamf survey last year that found 72 percent of employee respondents would choose a Mac over a PC for their work device.

"Offering Mac is a 'need to have,' not a 'nice to have,'" Alampi said. "Organizations need to offer choice if they want more-productive, more-engaged, more-fulfilled, more-loyal employees."