Mapping Your Business Goals to Cloud Solutions
By Wally Seliga|
April 26, 2017
The debate over whether to move to the cloud is over, and the cloud has won. Not only do the majority (87%) of mid-market C-level executives agree that cloud is their future IT model, but the typical IT department will already be operating the majority their apps and platforms in the cloud rather than on-premises by 2018.
Despite cloud computing being regarded as an important step in the evolution of organizations, many businesses still grapple with aligning cloud technology to their business strategies in order to determine the best path forward. As the pace of cloud adoption increases and begins to seep into every layer of business, IT and business leaders can no longer afford to maintain siloed cloud initiatives. Successful cloud adoption requires a strategy where IT, line-of-business people, and executives are all seated at the table, helping to prioritize where to focus their cloud efforts in order to capitalize on their investments with the highest business value before jumping into the next transition.
Aligning the Right Cloud Strategy to Fit Your Business Goals
To help businesses see the bigger picture when it comes to cloud adoption, we’ve broken business/cloud alignment into three elements. First, prioritize your business goals. Second, identify the IT objectives for transitioning to the cloud. Finally, choose which cloud solution is best suited for a given need.
Let’s look at a few examples of how to map your business goals to cloud solutions.
| Common Business Goals |
IT Objectives |
Cloud Fit |
| Reduce Cost |
Plan for scale and growth |
IaaS, PaaS, SaaS |
| Retain Customers |
Prepare for high availability scenarios |
SaaS, ASR, Azure Backup |
| Retain Employees |
Increase accessibility |
Mobility, Remove Apps, Web Apps, Remote Access |
| Improve Time to Market |
Execute a “Cloud First” strategy |
Remove Physical Hardware Limitations |
| Increase Revenues |
Leverage corporate owned data assets |
Machine Learning, Predictive Analytics, Big Data |
| Accelerate Expansion |
Transform IT and align to business |
Proactive, Strategy-first Approach to Leverage Technology to Enable Growth |
What business goals are you prioritizing? Is there something on your list that we didn’t touch on above? BDO Digital helps mid-size organizations develop a clear, often staged approach to cloud adoption that focuses on real business challenges first. We specialize in helping you identify which actions and cloud investments will have the greatest impact on achieving rapid results and sustained long-term success.
