Spurred on by the COVID-19 pandemic and the sudden demand for remote work, organisations are taking the necessary steps to move their applications to the cloud. To do so effectively, business must seek reliable insights to develop a plan and sound migration strategy. A variety of options from cloud solutions providers allows each business to choose the path that best serves its needs and objectives – if only they knew what to look for.
Move Away from Legacy Software
By building up both automation and cloud capabilities, cloud computing is the starting point for IT automation. Acknowledging the shortcomings of legacy software and embracing cloud solutions delivers a substantial increase in scalability, agility, flexibility, efficiency, and cost savings.
Legacy software:
- Often requires expert users to manage and create workflows
- Requires near-manual handoffs between organisations
- Is strained under different applications for business management
- Is usually behind current versions due to the customisations needed to adapt software
First Step to the Cloud
- Consider the time to return on the upgrade investment
- Consider the functionality that serves focused business silos; a way to start without requiring alignment and effort from many people across departments
- Drive an organisational culture change to promote an analytics-first attitude
While it may seem daunting, this culture shift can be achieved by:
- Leaving applications in place but moving data to the cloud, enabling insights across data silos and accurate monitoring of enterprise KPIs; and
- Moving to a modern, cloud-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) or digital operations platform to open potential (more inclusive and consistent workflows, a common user experience across the organisation, and mobile access to tools and data)
A Team to Drive Change
The key to successful migration is to bring business and technical stakeholders together to develop a holistic set of requirements. Include an architecture function that can identify critical needs for integration, scalability, performance, and technology maintenance. Maximise the future agility of the new platform for ease of extension and provide options for future requirements that may develop.
Data Preparation
With the cloud you can bring data together from disparate systems to gain the visibility needed to align operations and employees. This offers:
- The ability to assess data cleanliness and data quality through improved input and archiving unnecessary data
- A clear, strong approach to application integration, including the definition of data exchange standards and semantic maps to contextualise data once aggregated
- API-driven interfaces to maximise scalability and flexibility
Tools and Partners Selection
When moving to the cloud, it is critical to identify the right platform technologies. Considerations should include ease of integration, user access management, data aggregation, analytics, and reporting.
- Choose a digital transformation partner that:
- Recognises the need to realise time to value
- Offers a phased approach with clear milestones
- Demonstrates a focus on business KPIs during the implementation and post-deployment phases
A successful company does not simply move its applications to the cloud, but also makes change orientation a priority. This prepares the business to take on future challenges and opportunities.