Table of Contents
Introduction to Cloud Migration
Cloud migration is the process of migrating data, applications, and every other business element onto a cloud computing environment. The businesses demand scalability, flexibility and reliability and Covid19 has brought more pace to this migration however implementation is a struggle for many organizations.
The method of migration to the cloud for an organization brings up multiple challenges: the cloud migration journeys could go wrong if not planned in a strategic manner. And these migration mistakes could cost enterprise money and time and reduction in expected outcomes such as increased agility, scalability, lower costs etc.
Today in this article we will look at common mistakes which could lead to failure of cloud migration and how to avoid them while planning cloud migration in your organization.
Pitfalls of Cloud Migration
Inadequate Training
Cloud services provide scalability and agility and ease of use. But as per Gartner inadequate skills of team members is one of the main reasons for delays in cloud adoption, blotched migrations which can go on for years.
New tools and new adaptations to existing processes are the demands in cloud migrations so existing team members and resources should have adequate skill sets and enough training to plan the journey of migration. Based on job roles and responsibilities existing team mates need to perform, are required to be given new skills training and its most cost effective instead of bringing in qualified resources from outside.
Cloud Security Negligence
Data security should be top priority for any organization be it on premises or cloud based. Data migration to a cloud computing environment could be confusing sometimes and could lead to misconfigured servers susceptible to cyber security attacks. Moving data on the cloud does not make it secure by assumption. Cloud providers do offer several security measures still you are also responsible for cloud security.
Poor Estimation of Costs & Timelines
In the wake of getting rid of expensive hardware and legacy server deployed in on premises deployment, sudden movement to cloud to vastly reduce IT spending could take a hit on your application if you have not carefully tested and planned the cloud readiness of your applications. With an assessment organization can determine which operations are ideal for cloud migration and which may require to be redesigned to fit for cloud or on premises deployments. Different costs need to be assigned to different migration scenarios and estimation of time and cost is needed to move data to the cloud computing environment.
Lack of Proper Strategy & Business Goals
Organizations’ decisions to move to cloud should have clear purpose and reason why they are planning to move onto cloud. Cloud migration for any organization must be a well defined process and they should be aware of challenges and pain areas for which planning is set in motion to shift operations onto cloud such as high costs of legacy servers, applications, scalability and agility demands of businesses are on rise. Each purpose would require a different approach well suited to the condition.
Choosing the wrong Migration Approach & Time
Many organizations want to move onto cloud but knowing the right time to do it and identifying it is a common challenge. Many companies spend a lot of time studying various migration strategies and checking potential pitfalls. Timing of migration is very important as you may not like to move your business onto cloud when you are sailing through some critical point in your business such as mergers, major acquisition, moving into or stepping into different domain / product/ service space etc.
Final Thoughts
Every migration plan is different and coming up with a migration plan is required to be on a case-to-case basis. It is always a good idea to consult a cloud solution provider or a cloud architect to understand present infrastructure before making any plan for move. The ideal planning should be a time when you need to change your hardware and when operations are not in critical state.