Developing an Enterprise Cloud Strategy - Part 1

By Shantanu Kaushik

Cloud computing is setting trends. Digital transformation is the equivalent of crossing a bridge today towards a safer and brighter tomorrow. Enterprises require solutions that bring business intelligence to introduce both business continuity and productivity. While a lot of organizations are going through digital transformations, there is a considerable increase in investments from organizations with a cloud strategy already in place.

According to the latest forecast from Gartner, “Worldwide IT spending is projected to total $3.9 trillion in 2021, an increase of 6.2% from 2020.”

2020 saw enormous growth in employees working from home and remote work culture. The remote and contactless concepts facilitated continuity in many fields, including education. Many projections say organizations’ IT spending habits will return to normal and grow considerably in 2021.

Gartner stated, “All IT spending segments are forecast to return to growth in 2021. Enterprise software is expected to have the strongest rebound (8.8%) as remote work environments are expanded and improved. The devices segment will see the second highest growth in 2021 (8%) and is projected to reach $705.4 billion in IT spending.”

Certain segments, such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Automation, are expected to gain more momentum and get bigger budgets from organizations. There is a significant increase in organizations looking to adopt the cloud after formulating a strategy.

In this article, we will explain how to create a robust and cost-effective cloud strategy to simplify your digital transformation requirements.

Think before You Begin

Shifting to a cloud setup is about prioritizing growth over traditional and stagnant business safety. Adopting cloud computing over traditional business practices might seem a little risky. However, the plethora of benefits associated with cloud computing is more than enough to overcome any migration risks. Let’s talk about two major advantages when shifting to the cloud:

Moving Ahead with Time

If your competition has already shifted to the cloud, it could slow down your progress.

Leadership

As a leader, you are responsible for the good decisions and the bad ones. Leadership suggests making informed and in-time decisions to boost the growth of your organization. Making well-informed decisions with input from your IT teams showcases leadership.

What Should Your Cloud Strategy Include?

A well-formulated cloud strategy contains an outline of what cloud computing will bring to the organization. We do not recommend moving the entire business to the cloud. Migration is always done in phases.

While strategizing a shift plan, you should list which parts you want to migrate to the cloud and keep in-house. You can compare your cloud strategy to a good cookbook; continue adding recipes and modifying the recipes to make them better.

Evolution is inevitable. Things that do not evolve become obsolete and phase out. Upgradation leads to continuity and more chances of success.

Gartner predicts, “ Through 2024, businesses will be forced to accelerate digital business transformation plans by at least five years to survive in a post-COVID-19 world that involves permanently higher adoption of remote work and digital touchpoints. IT spending related to remote work will total $332.9 billion in 2021, an increase of 4.9% from 2020.”

Leverage the Cloud – Complexities – Solutions

A good strategy and the requirements of your business will pave your way to a near-perfect cloud practice. You need to outline a cloud solution for every complexity you face in your current business practice to make an informed shift to the cloud. You can start by investing more time on the drafting board and slowly move towards the first solution.

Cloud Strategy – Challenges

The prominent challenges associated with formulating an effective cloud strategy are listed below:

Never Too Late: Some organizations think, “We are already too late to jump to the cloud.” You are never too late.
Plug-and-Play Digital Transformation: One of my close friends from Alibaba Cloud pointed out, “While undergoing or adopting digital transformation, every trade or organization has a different set of requirements that make or complete their digital transformation journey.” This information outlines an important piece of information. You cannot look at a case study for another organization and take their same journey; this plug-and-play strategy will fail. Organizations should formulate a specific set of requirements and choose the corresponding path and solution.
Cloud Implementation vs. Cloud Strategy: An effective cloud strategy includes business outcomes after cloud solution implementation. You need to consider redundancies and the aftermath to expand into the solution or change your approach based on the outcome.
IT-Centric Cloud Strategy: Organizations should gather opinions from every department. Not doing so could be a huge mistake.
Exit Strategy: Irrespective of how effective your organization can implement and adopt a cloud-based architecture, not formulating or not weighing in on every counter stance a solution may take can be solved using an exit strategy.

Continued in Part 2

In Part 2 of this series, we will discuss solutions to the challenges in this article. We will also help you choose the correct services and cloud architecture.

Upcoming Articles

Developing an Enterprise Cloud Strategy – Part 2

Community

Developing an Enterprise Cloud Strategy - Part 1

Think before You Begin

Moving Ahead with Time

Leadership

What Should Your Cloud Strategy Include?

Leverage the Cloud – Complexities – Solutions

Cloud Strategy – Challenges

Continued in Part 2

Upcoming Articles

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