So by now everybody and their gran (maybe not?!) has heard of the cloud however I am still surprised when talking day to day with customers how many people, even those involved in the IT side of things, have skewed negative preconceptions that continue to put them off implementing and taking advantage of cloud services for their organisation. This brought me to the realisation that perhaps we as specialists are simply not doing enough to get the proper message out to dispel some myths and put people at ease from scaremongering and hopefully I can clear a few things up in this post. Below I’ve listed 3 of the most common things we hear and the reasons why they shouldn’t be putting you off!
1) I’m unsure if I can trust my data will be secure in the cloud
If we take most of the conversations I’m having then the cloud that we are referring to would be that of Microsoft Azure. For Microsoft security is the top priority and they have invested heavily to ensure data they host is as secure as possible. In fact all the top providers have as they know one slip up and their whole reputation is ruined. To put it simply, you would be extremely hard pushed to find an on premise data infrastructure that is more secure than the major and trusted cloud providers that businesses are using.
2) I can’t go move our infrastructure to the cloud as we have to store sensitive data on site for compliance reasons
Again surprised by how many have not been informed of the hybrid model we often implement for our customers. A hybrid model is when some of your infrastructure is hosted on site and some in the cloud. What is stored where depends on each customer but really you can pick and choose what is most suitable to move. Microsoft are also overcoming the compliance challenge of many highly regulated organisations by opening two UK data centres so they know their data can be stored within the UK.
3) I’ve heard it can be very expensive
Sometimes at first it might look expensive but in fact you are far more likely to be saving money by implementing cloud services. For example you don’t need to worry about investing in equipment, security, networking, power or cooling amongst others. You can also forecast your costs and accurately plan budgets with the ‘pay as you go’ easy scale up/down model of cloud services.
So basically in summary what we’re saying is the cloud can be great for your business! We’d love to hear from you to take you on your cloud journey all the way from planning the best strategy for your organisation to facilitating your migration. Drop us a mail at sales@consilium-uk.com or call us on 0141 847 1545.
Joel Scott
