Evolve IP recently released a survey indicating that the growth of cloud computing is not slowing down. In fact, adoption is rapidly increasing among groups that were rather reluctant to embrace it in the beginning, including business executives and IT directors. These groups have become committed to learning as much about cloud computing as possible, and what they have learned has increased their interest and enthusiasm for cloud computing products.
Evolve IP attributes this interest to business leaders seeing how cloud computing can really benefit their organizations via scalability, flexibility, disaster recovery and especially cost savings. According to the survey, nearly “70 percent of c-level, vice president and IT director-level respondents consider themselves ‘cloud believers’ while 53 percent of IT managers describe themselves that way.”
But not every business group has embraced cloud computing. In fact, the most resistance comes from the people working hands-on with it: IT managers.
IT Managers Still Reluctant
So, why the pushback from IT managers?
Much of the concern comes from security worries and loss of control. If people within the organization can just sign on with a cloud service provider for their email or virtual servers, then they may actually just go around the IT department, causing fears about job losses.
The other major hang-ups are security and privacy issues. IT managers have all heard about major breaches at data centers, and then there is the concern about data just being “in the cloud.”
For the most part, however, these apprehensions are unfounded. Cloud computing can be just as safe as on-premise software and hardware as long as you take the necessary safety and security precautions. IT managers also should not worry about their jobs – as long as they are willing to embrace cloud computing. According to the Evolve IP survey, most businesses still want and need IT departments because they help create new innovations and processes for the company.
How is Cloud Computing Being Used?
For the most part, the companies that are moving to cloud computing are focusing on Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) products, especially cloud server and storage products (i.e., backup and disaster recovery/business continuity solutions). Hosted Exchange email is also on the rise.
Online solutions allow employees to access their email, contacts and calendars from any device with an Internet connection, meaning they can work even when they’re not in the office.
The products that are not being moved to the cloud for the most part include phone services and office products.
The major product that most companies are not moving to the cloud is Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). These platforms run nearly everything for the company, meaning that if the ERP system was to go down, the company would be in big trouble.
There are, however, benefits to using a cloud ERP platform. For example, it is easier to integrate your ERP platform with other software systems if they are all cloud-based, including other Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications. Also, you can often manage everything from a single dashboard.
Have you moved all or some of your business operations to cloud computing? What has your experience been like? FBN
Tony Alam is senior product manager, cloud, at Savvis, a CenturyLink company.
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