I get the question all the time ‘What does a Cloud Strategist do?”
Do you remember those days as a kid camping in the backyard? Leaving the comfort of your house to the wild uncertain outdoors of your back yard. You had a tent, sleeping bag, some snacks mom put together for you and that was about it. Wait, the dog, you just could not risk being out there without the dog. That good, trusty security blanket that always made you feel like you were never alone. One added critical tool you needed was dad’s old camping flashlight. You remember that flashlight that only showed you what was directly in front of you but not really great for what the trail looked like all the way back to the house.
So, what does that have to do with the Cloud?
Well, it’s not as simple as talking about the similarities of backyard camping but you must resonate with the idea of a shift in your thinking. Now think of what it’s like to transform that same setting into what is today’s migration to cloud computing.
Your current Data Center is like your house. Your computing systems are the comfortable confines in your home that you know and are as familiar with as your family and the rest of what’s in your house. Tools in the garage, food in the fridge, etc.
Cloud Computing is like that wild, uncertain outdoors for most folks in the beginning. Your back yard and tent are where your systems and data would live in this new cloud computing world.
The analogies continue…but the single most important thing you had in that tent was the dog next to you and the flashlight in your hand. Security and the ability to see across that seemingly huge backyard.
Before you take that leap to shifting a large computing capability to a Cloud solution, you need those two very things.
Confidence in the security being applied and the ability to have strategic vision that provides insight into both your systems and data like it was in your own datacenter, or better.
Our team at Planet provides Cloud Strategy sessions for all our top tier clients on a regular, periodic basis. We help you visualize what it means to go from your current computing environment to utilizing some of the best, world class computing available including the hard numbers that back it up. Nearly every client we talk to about this transformation has the idea that their environment is largely different than anyone else. While each of you will have business specific nuances, the road to the cloud (not to be confused with one of my all-time favorite songs) is a very well-worn path.
Establishing your approach and plan for that transformation is exactly what a Cloud Strategist does.
Modeled after the standard Gartner capability chart, Planet has defined a Cloud Maturity Model (CMM) that helps us identify your starting point in this journey as well as ensuring a larger, holistic view of your entire computing needs, from end user systems to high end data center computing requirements are considered.
At Planet, our team is very fortunate to be enabled with a team of some of the best Architects and Engineers available who help us develop a deployment plan that meets with this vision. Being able to take a strong, well thought through plan and execute it so your organization can gain the overall value of this migration is as critical as the plan itself.
Take a short trip on the interwebs to https://www.youalreadyownit.com/
If we can help make the transition across your back yard a well-worn path as comfortable as that dog and flashlight, let us know how we can help.
Follow us @PlanetCldStrt