We are more than ever aware of the need to continuously transform our businesses to adapt to the changes in operational and business needs. The necessity to be competitive, scale quickly and minimize risk, has driven cloud adoption at a rate never seen before.
Some organizations are just starting to shift to the cloud, focusing on the migration of existing digital assets. Others target a deeper transition to cloud-native, and many are already analysing how to adopt multi-cloud architectures.
No matter the level of cloud adoption and maturity, there is one common thread: the need for a solid Cloud Strategy.
What is it?
A cloud strategy defines the outline for the role the cloud has in the organization and provides a coherent approach to cloud usage, resources and cost optimization.
It is a part of the corporate digital strategy and its goal is to use technology to improve business performance, creating competitive advantages. As the company’s digital assets and goals evolve, so should the cloud strategy.
Key aspects to consider
A common misconception about cloud strategies is that they only need to focus on the technical and financial aspects to be successful. All departments of a company are stakeholders of the cloud strategy. It’s necessary to have a global awareness of what is planned and include the inputs of all stakeholders in the definition of the strategy.
The bigger the impact on the organization, the more important it is to include a change management plan that follows the transformation from beginning to end.
For the strategy to succeed we must make sure there is a deep alignment with the business’s top-line goals but also take into account the staffing and skill sets necessary to operationalize it.
Another key aspect to include is alternative and fallback scenarios in case of an unforeseen impediment that can take many forms, such as technical, time-based or even financial.
How can I make the most of my Cloud?
As the organization’s cloud adoption increases and the advantages it brings become more evident, the following go-to topic is usually how to optimize costs.
The nature of the cloud allows for many types of financial optimizations. For example within the traditional IaaS scope, some of the most common strategies include having reserved resources, stopping them during off-hours and dynamically adapting capacity to the actual loads.
But it is the adoption of multiple scopes of cloud use that has the most potential to optimize costs in the long run. It will allow gains that go well beyond the financial side.
It is necessary to include in the applications and services transformation roadmap the use of the multitude of options the cloud has to offer, such as serverless computing, microservices, native PaaS or dynamic orchestration, to name a few.
This drives organizations to become more agile with cloud-first architectures, enabling them to explore scenarios such as multi-cloud adoption, once again minimizing risk and opening the door to new services and financial optimizations.
The App Modernization strategy must be closely aligned with the Cloud Strategy. It is important to not forget that the cloud resources are there to enable the applications and services that are running on them.
Remember to innovate
Cloud is one of the fastest growing areas and one of the most innovative as well. Innovation is something all cloud-adopting organizations should include in their strategies as well. It is necessary to explore the new services cloud providers release regularly, to properly prepare and plan for the next wave of digital transformation.
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