By Paul Starkman

At the top of the list of risks guaranteed to give HR a headache this year is employee use of personal technology for work.

It was only a few short years ago that employers began to embrace the bring-your-own-device (BYOD) trend, allowing employees to use their personal phones, tablets and laptops for work.

Today, bring-your-own-device into the workplace is a given, with nearly two-thirds of technology-dependent Millennials using a personal device at work

BYOD policies growing rapidly

As the mobile workforce grows, more and more corporate IT departments are officially acknowledging that people prefer to use one device for personal and professional use.

According to Gartner, the information technology research firm, by 2017 half of all companies will expect employees to use their personal devices for work.

A mobile workforce increases security risks, challenging IT departments to develop solutions that aren't heavy-handed. Employees understandably bristle over procedures and policies that appear to threaten their privacy or limit how they can use their smart phones and tablets to get work done.

HR can play a front-and-center role in managing the unintended consequences of tension and mistrust by working with IT to create policies that balance the corporation's security needs with the employees confidentiality and privacy requirements.

5 areas you should focus on

In 2014, set your policies and design your security architecture around these broad areas:

• Update your mobile device policies to engage employees in shared responsibility for protecting corporate data. In the past, mobile device security policies generally were limited to employees who accessed corporate networks through devices that were company-owned. In 2014, review, update and extend those policies to include employee-owned hardware and software usage. Regardless of who owns the device, an effective policy includes a user agreement that clearly defines employee eligibility, usage, approved devices and platforms.