The Importance of a Defined Cloud Strategy
Migrating your company’s IT infrastructure to the cloud can be a daunting task, but as technology and the IT industry evolve, it may be a task that can’t be put off forever. However, lacking a well-defined cloud strategy can impede your company’s transition to the cloud or halt it altogether.
But where do you begin? It can be as simple as just a few steps.
A Three-Step Process:
Step 1: First, you need to lay out a high-level business case. What do you hope to accomplish? What is your company’s main objective in switching to cloud computing and does it align with the company’s overall business goals? Some of the high-level benefits of cloud computing include increased business agility, cost control, risk mitigation and system/network/service/data availability. (Hmmm, where have I seen those before?). It is important to remember that many of these benefits will be realized over the long term.
Step 2: Next, you will want to consider your enterprise requirements. How much of your infrastructure do you want to support on a cloud platform? Do you have legacy systems that are not cloud-ready? Also consider your business’s security, performance, governance and growth needs for all computing infrastructure that will be migrating.
Step 3: Due diligence in steps 1 and 2 will aid you greatly in this final step – selecting the best solution for your company. Public cloud, private cloud or hybrid? Do you want to do a full infrastructure as a service with managed services, do you want platform as a service, or are you looking for software as a service? Not sure what you need? You may not have the expertise on staff to evaluate your options, and that is OK. Once you have determined your business case and enterprise requirements, you’ll be able to begin a conversation with a trusted hosting partner that has the expertise to help guide you to the right cloud solution for your business.
The most important thing to remember is that migrating to the cloud is an overall business strategy, not just an IT function. Reach out to me or anyone at your local Expedient data center for more information.
