Cloud Computing: Planning for Success

Cloud computing has made things so easy that successful implementation seems like a given. Just select a good solution, move all the data to the cloud, and you’re ready. How hard can it really be? Truth be told, herein lies all the trouble. Despite the enormous amount of effort the past decades have required for understanding system design, IT managers continue to grope for the silver bullet.

To a certain extent, cloud computing has been a victim of over-enthusiasm and over-simplification, leading to lack of robustness.

Haste leads to trouble

Here’s a typical scenario: A company sees cloud computing all around it and wonders what it is missing. So the management hire a consultant, and business pressures being what they are, require the migration to complete ASAP. Not all stakeholders are consulted, and neither is much time spent on understanding the challenges involved. The result is a new system with the same pain areas as before. Sounds familiar?

Technology is not the answer

As the history of enterprise computing has been telling us time and again, technology is not the answer to real-world problems. Sure, it can lower barriers and make processes more efficient, but to say that it would take care of entire systems on its own would be an overstatement. Careful analysis and deep understanding of the intricacies involved is the only way out.

As we all should know beyond a doubt by now, change is the only constant in life. Perhaps it’s time IT managers start giving the idea a little more consideration.