A plethora of emerging ‘cloud computing’ providers, both large and small, are offering an increasingly wide range of services in this emerging and therefore relatively confusing market place. Given this background, it’s fair to say it’s become increasingly difficult for business owners and managers to see the wood from the trees. In such a new and emerging market with so many different propositions all being made to fall under the same ‘cloud’ banner, it makes it extremely difficult for business owners and managers to understand what might be the right proposition(s) for their business and, critically important, who the right provider(s) is to deliver the capability?
We often get asked the question through different forums, both on and offline, “What are the most important factors when choosing a cloud provider”. Our answer is simple, we believe that it is critically important that due diligence is done before committing to any cloud provider and a number of factors need to be considered. We thought it may be helpful to our wider audience to offer our view on what we believe are the most important factors to consider when choosing a cloud provider:
1. Many IT companies are only now realising that the cloud will become the mainstream model for consuming IT functionality so there’s a tendency to characterise what they do as ‘cloud something’ in order to ride the ‘cloud’ wave. Remember it’s not about how long they have been in the IT industry but more about how long they have been delivering cloud services in the real world to real customers.
2. Look at the provenance and commercial track record of the company. Has the cloud provider recently been an on-premise IT support company that is trying to re-invent itself? or has it been in the business of delivering cloud services for a comparatively long time?
3. Ask to look at the provider’s current client base and ask to speak one-to-one to a small selection of existing customers to gauge how effective the delivery and therefore the user experience is.
4. What is the approach to their role as a service provider? What is their attitude to and understanding of their stewardship role in relation to customer data? Can you be certain that this service provider will protect your data in the same way that your bank protects your money?
5. What is the quality of the technical solution? Is it going to meet all your business requirements? Moving to the cloud should not be simply seen as a cost saving exercise; what makes it compelling is that it can enable companies to work smarter and more flexibly which will yield efficiency gains and cost savings in other areas. Ultimately it’s about whether the solution actually meets your needs and improves your business’ capability.
6. Technical competence of their staff. Is the company’s staff adequately skilled/trained to be custodians of your data, to offer great customer support and to continuously improve the solution they deliver?
7. Last and often overlooked is ‘organisational fit’. If your cloud service provider is going to provide the majority of your IT functionality, they will be one of your key trusted providers – Will you get on with them? Do they see you as a commercial partner to whom they provide a critical service or just another transactional sale? Are you confident that they have the ability to understand your business and proactively develop what your business will need into the future?
To find out more about the cloud, the different cloud catagories and some of the providers that fall into these you can download our white paper – Making Sense of the ‘Cloud’
If you have any questions related to this article or the points raised, then please get in touch. We would be more than happy to engage with you.
The Extrinsica Global Team
