poor planning
Without a detailed cloud strategy, this can be a problem. “A pragmatic and structured architectural approach is essential when moving to the cloud,” said William Pelzers, Principal and Head of Center of Excellence at business consulting firm Capgemini Americas.
In particular, he points out that strategic thinking is essential when moving to the cloud. “If you design and prepare a proper architecture, you can save at least a few days of troubleshooting and debugging time when something goes wrong,” he said. It is also important to learn from any mistakes made between planning and migration. “Those who jump into the cloud and try to figure it out will not succeed,” he warned.
Misconceptions about migration
Cloud migration is not a one-time process. “It’s an ongoing journey with complex interrelated issues,” says Khaltik Narrain, chief cloud officer at business consultancy Accenture.
Many IT managers mistakenly view cloud migration as a traditional project with fundamental start and end dates. However, according to a recent study by Accenture, 32% of companies that consider their cloud transition complete are actually putting their organization at risk and losing the value gained.
“If organizations focus solely on cost reduction, they may be at a disadvantage compared to organizations that more strategically use the many dynamic forms of cloud, including public, private, and edge cloud,” says Narrain. In fact, our research shows that those organizations that strategically considered the cloud saved more money than those that focused solely on efficiency. »
Underestimating cloud costs
It’s a common misconception that migrating to the cloud always results in immediate cost savings. Aref Martin, CTO of John Wiley & Sons, said: “The reality is moving to the cloud is expensive. And if you don’t have a complete picture of all your costs, your business can fail,” he warned.
Migrating to the cloud often results in cost savings. However, careful and detailed planning is essential. Nevertheless, as the migration to the cloud progresses, hidden costs will appear and inevitably increase. “You need to make sure you have an overall cloud budget at the start of the project,” advises Martin.
Cloud costs come in many forms. Sometimes there are easily identifiable costs, such as the cost of abandoning an existing data facility. However, in the case of high costs, it is not so safe. “For example, talent-related costs such as retraining, upskilling, and finding the right cloud talent, or the cost of restructuring the business,” he says. All of these costs need to be considered when planning,” he explains.
easy to use
The early days of cloud computing are coming to an end. Most companies already have some form of cloud infrastructure in place, says Ronen Schwartz, senior vice president and general manager of cloud storage at NetApp, a hybrid cloud data management and data services company.
He explains that Cloud is at an inflection point. Most organizations still have significant amounts of data, applications, and workloads on-premises, even as they continue to migrate to the cloud. But for many of these companies, he thinks, they are now moving towards an evolved cloud, a hybrid multicloud environment where cloud services are fully integrated into an organization’s architecture and operations.
“It simplifies management and breaks down silos to provide observability everywhere. This evolved cloud is exactly what its name suggests. This is not the end state.
As businesses move into the evolved cloud, Schwartz recommends moving forward to avoid congestion. “If you’ve migrated an application, you can now refactor it for the cloud,” he says. Once you’ve refactored, you can now optimize for performance or cost.” Either way, Schwartz advises going ahead and scaling with the cloud.
poor data accessibility
One of the biggest challenges that many large enterprises face is leveraging data distributed across different systems. “Ensuring that data is accessible and secure across multiple environments, both on-premises and in applications running in the cloud, is becoming an increasing headache,” says Darlene Williams, CIO of Rocket Software, a development company of software. Aimed at mainframe technology users a surveyhe said, found that 80% of respondents believe mainframe technology is still important to their business operations.
Abandoning data stored in outdated systems could deprive services of access to potentially valuable information. Companies that lean too heavily towards the cloud risk forgetting the inherent value of data anchored in outdated hardware, Williams warns.
Disorganized proliferation of platforms
IT managers should consolidate and merge cloud-based services wherever possible to reduce costs and avoid platform proliferation, says Wayne Carter, vice president of engineering at Couchbase, a technology provider for cloud database. “For example, if you use a multimodal database instead of multiple databases, you can manage different data types and models in a single unified backend, avoiding data proliferation and unnecessary expense,” he said. -he declares.
Carter advises IT managers to look deep within their organization to understand how software resources are being used. “You may find that you have software that allows you to add multiple licenses for use by multiple teams across the business,” he says.
insufficient security
Lax security can make cloud initiatives an IT nightmare. “To avoid cloud security mistakes, you need to understand your cloud environment and make sure safeguards are in place to protect your infrastructure from external and internal security threats,” says Emmanuel Nodim, cloud architect at the firm. IT consulting SPR. Failure to protect against external and internal threats can lead to serious consequences. Indeed, the reputation of the organization is threatened, the confidence of customers is shaken and significant financial losses may occur. Nordim recommends including a thorough security assessment at every stage of your cloud plan.
Underestimation of required skills
Many companies underestimate the amount of planning and work required to solve real design and operational problems. “And in the face of such challenges, companies are struggling to find the skills and experience they need to solve them,” says Sunil Moorjani, director of ISG, a global technology research and consulting firm.
The advent of multi-cloud environments combined with the continued shortage of talent has made cloud deployment and management more complex, Moorjani explained. As a result, many users were disappointed with the cloud-first results. Nearly 70% of respondents to a recent ISG survey met just 20% of their key goals, and the majority were well over budget and over schedule, he said.
Even when looking at cloud adoption realistically, many IT leaders fail to understand that cloud adoption isn’t just a technical exercise. “Companies also need to be vigilant with their contractual obligations,” he warned, noting that multi-year contracts can trap unwary customers into costly and inflexible consumption patterns.
precipitous migration
Overzealous cloud migrants tend to underestimate the long-term costs associated with failing to optimize legacy applications and prefer a “lift and shift” migration approach. “Companies that go digital without having the right steps in place face 10% higher than average cloud costs, 400% slower delivery times for outdated applications, and higher risk,” said Marco Roman, field operations manager for e-Core in North America. will face losses due to security vulnerabilities, enormous maintenance and compliance requirements. Ignoring the procedure in the beginning like this is definitely a little chat room,” he pointed out.
do not look ahead
The cloud is constantly evolving and continues to support and improve core business operations in many ways. Companies should always look to the future when aligning their business strategies to adapt to multicloud, edge cloud computing and other advances, advises Mathias Loh, head of financial services technology at the business consulting firm EY Americas.
As CIOs consider which cloud strategy to pursue, how can they best future-proof and engineer cloud designs to avoid silos, drive new and profitable growth, and maintain efficiency, security, and transparency? “It is essential to have a clear and deliberate framework on how best to manage the risks and costs associated with the cloud,” he added.
ciokr@idg.co.kr
