The Top 3 Things IT Pros Want Business Leaders To Know About The Cloud
The cloud has taken on mythical proportions these days, which is causing huge frustration for IT pros. Why? They are often working in an environment in which business leaders, eager to move applications to the cloud, are making big decisions based on misconceptions and tidbits of information.
Here are three things IT pros want those business leaders to know about the cloud:
1. Don’t assume IT hasn’t looked at the cloud already.
“The IT Pros we speak with are working diligently to offer “ITaaS” to business leaders within their lines of business, and many have evaluated or even approved the use of one or more cloud service providers. Often the developer within the business unit is simply unaware of this fact,” said CenturyLink’s Vice President of Cloud Strategy and Business Development Jonathan King. Business leaders should partner with IT by first defining their business requirements and secondly taking the time to learn what infrastructure options their IT team has available to support them.
2. Sometimes public cloud is not the optimal solution for the business as a whole.
Most IT Pros have put concerted efforts towards understanding the
price/performance ratio of various workloads across on-premise
virtualized, dedicated hosting/private cloud, public cloud and/or hybrid
deployment models. Therefore IT Pros know that the best choice for the
overall business might not be to deploy the application strictly on
public cloud infrastructure. By collaborating on projects business
leaders and IT Pros can make informed decisions that deliver the best
price/performance possible.
3. “Shadow IT” in the cloud might introduce security risks, but not in the way business leaders might expect.
What people often fail to realize is that people, not technology, are
often the biggest obstacles to tight security. It’s true of on-premises
technology, and it’s true of the cloud. By deploying a cloud solution
that hasn’t been vetted by your IT department you might be introducing
unknown security risks to your business.
IT needs to have insight into what applications are running in the
cloud, which users have access to those applications and how the
applications are being used. These same IT professionals need to
quantify risk, insert controls for data security and ensure compliance.
This ensures sensitive information isn’t shared improperly outside the
company.
To learn why more businesses are considering a Hybrid IT approach – a
mix of colocation, managed services and cloud – download our latest
Hybrid IT white paper or find out how the right
cloud solution can support your business now and in the future.
