Cloud Is About Doing What You Do Better

Hi, my name is Chuck, and I'm a recovering cloud-oholic.

I have been deeply involved in the industry "cloud dialogue" for over two years now.

Frankly, I think we've done ourselves a collective disservice by focusing people on "the cloud" rather than the important part: how cloud concepts can help you do what you do better.

So much time debating what is cloud, and what is not cloud.  So much effort trying to untangle and decode confusing taxonomies.  And an entire industry that has realized something important is going on, and frantically trying to cloud-ify their stories.

I have been as guilty as any.  Well, today I'm going to try and kick the habit, and start focusing my dialog on what really matters -- doing what you already do, only doing it better.

A Blast From The Past

I was in the IT industry during the 1990s when internet fever took over.  For many years, it was All About The Internet -- what was it, how was it different, and how it was going to change everything.

As an interesting thought exercise, take your favorite "cloud" discussion and replace it with the word "internet", and see how strange all the resulting statements sound:

"A private internet is a false internet" 
"What is your internet strategy?"
"It's not an real internet unless it's infinitely elastic"
"Our products and services can be used to build an enterprise-class internet"
"You can't trust the internet, because it's not secure"

See how strange all of that sounds?

The reason is simple: the internet has touched just about everything we do these days: it's part of the world we live in.  We rarely think about it as a distinct entity, or something new and unusual.

In short: we still do what we've always done -- communicate, shop, monitor, browse, etc. as before, only we do it now a whole lot more efficiently.

And On To Clouds!

Delivering IT capabilities is what IT groups do.  Clouds don't really change that mission.

However, different aspects of the cloud discussion can change *how* you go about doing your job.
How you build IT.  How you operate IT.  How you consume IT.  There are entirely new options to go consider.

For most IT organizations, the potential impact (and the difficulty getting there!) is considerable.
Just like the advent of the modern internet changed a lot about how IT did their job, the same is becoming true for cloud.

But the job hasn't changed -- just the tools we use.

How You Do Enteprise IT Defines How You'll Think About Cloud

Every business model wants something a little different from the IT group.  Generalizations can be dangerously wrong.

At one end of the spectrum, there's the basics: simply end-user productivity and few core applications needed to run the business.  Nothing big, nothing complex.  

For these organizations, "cloud" means not having to do most of IT yourself -- someone else can do it for you. Sort of a better flavor of outsourcing :-)

At the other end of the spectrum, there are very focused business models where IT can easily deliver a competitive advantage -- smarter, faster, more efficient and more robust.  The organization expresses its unique intellectual capital through IT.

For these folks, cloud is about changing the investment model so that more of the IT dollar can be spent on maximizing that unique competitive advantage.

And most people fall somewhere in between those two extremes.

The Bottom Line

The question shouldn't be "what are you doing about cloud?"

The better question should be "what are you trying to get done in IT, and how can cloud help?"

Comments

[Paul Steward]

Hey Chuck, was told to touch base with you regarding a paper I'm working on titled "Cloud Computing". If you could contact me at these co-ordinates, I'll let you know what we're trying to do!

Regards,
Paul

[Chuck Hollis]

Hi Paul

Your company -- MediaPlanet - seems to be based on a "pay to say" model. Can't really help you if that's your intent.

Cheers!

-- Chuck

[Mike Workman]

With regard to comment - LOL.