After completing our Discovery Workshop, the answer is “yes”. The technology environments of both customers already have the baseline building blocks for developing a private cloud; virtualization and abstraction technologies in place to separate the Service of IT from traditional IT Services. As a result, the change to cloud is an incremental one from an infrastructure and applications perspective. However, the other two aspects of a truly virtualized environment, specifically the IT Business Processes and Financial Models to support IT are going to require a wholesale change in approach; moving to an organizational structure and services model which allows for charge-back or show-back of IT utilization, and a service availability focus instead of an application availability focus.
The single largest surprise for both customers is that they are already over half-way there, but while their questions have been focused on the technology, the real challenge is in the business side of the equation; how you structure the organization to support this new cloud model. The good news is that both organizations now have a road map in place to help them move forward to a true cloud-based service delivery model.
Do you know if you are ready for the Cloud?
Steve Harris, CTO-Canada, OnX