As organisations continue to grapple with the era of digital disruption and everything that it brings, it can be difficult to sift through all the available information on cloud computing and form an accurate, well-informed and practical attitude towards the cloud that you can leverage for the future development of your organisation.
There’s on-premises, private, public, hybrid, colocation, and that’s without even beginning to assess the vendor landscape. With so much noise, the key reasons behind a cloud migration can sometimes get lost in translation.
When assessing the viability of a cloud migration, first and foremost, it’s important to focus on the business outcomes and improvements that you’re looking to garner from the cloud, the specifics of its makeup and location can come later with help from a managed services provider.
So, let’s focus on those key benefits and explore five reasons to make the cloud home.
1. Uncharted levels of efficient collaboration
It really wasn’t that long ago when everyone working on a particular project had to be connected via the same network or be in the same location in order to collaborate effectively across documents and files. The cloud has rendered the aforementioned obsolete. Obsolete in the sense that your staff don’t need to be under the same roof to collaborate, you can communicate with a contractor remotely, you can share documents with customers remotely, and you can facilitate any number of people collaborating on the same document with the click of a finger.
2. Future proof your organisation with a scalable solution
In the current climate, it’s impossible to accurately predict future demands. The cloud gives you peace of mind on this front with the ability to scale your operation and storage needs up or down depending on your requirements at any given time. As an example, an accountancy firm would require more capacity through the months of July – October owing to tax returns. With the cloud, a firm can scale up their capacity to accommodate the increased need for storage capacity, but then scale down once peak tax-return season has concluded to avoid over spending.
3. Hybrid cloud delivers ultimate flexibility
Private cloud provides incredible levels of security for organisations that need to keep critical data on-premises for easy access and compliance requirements. Public cloud is fantastic for mobile organisations that need quick and unrestricted access to data sets from anywhere, at any time. But what if your organisation is in need of both? Hybrid cloud environments exist to address this exact predicament, you can enjoy the accessibility and mobility of the public cloud while also leveraging the privacy and security of the private cloud.
4. Rest assured your business is prepared for a disaster
It goes without saying, but disaster can strike at any time. Whether through a cybersecurity attack or natural disaster, it’s critical that your data is safe and available for quick access to mitigate any potential downtime. When you leverage the cloud, you ensure that your data is backed up and protected in an off-site location so that in the event of a disaster, you can access it quickly to keep your bottom dollar ticking over.
5. Reduced costs and better cost predictability
No matter your industry, market or geographic location, you’re always looking to save expenditure where possible, and the cloud can deliver on a number of fronts. By moving away from on-site IT infrastructure, you’re no longer forking out expensive capital outlays for equipment, you’re most likely saving on energy consumption, and the cost of system upgrades are often included in your contract. Additionally, those that opt for a managed service on a consumption-based model also save money on staff wages, and only pay for what they use, no more, no less.
We should highlight that these are by no means the only organisational benefits to cloud computing. If anything, these barely start to scratch the surface. But they do help you start to consider how the cloud can help your organisation moving forward.
If the cloud is something on your radar, this is the train of thought you should adopt at the offset; identify what you want to achieve from an organisational standpoint, and once you’ve identified that speak to us.
Mangano IT help Queensland organisations undertake cloud discovery assessments on a daily basis. Getting the right infrastructure and cloud balance is key to your readiness for the digital economy and in partnership with Microsoft, Mangano IT delivers an ever-expanding set of cloud services through Microsoft Azure that gives you a bespoke solution, designed with your unique organisational outcomes in mind.
For more information on our discovery assessments, contact our infrastructure and cloud team today.
