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Cloud Migration: Preparedness May Help Government Orgs Reap Proven Benefits

It’s no secret that when it comes to adopting new technologies and IT systems, Government organizations are generally more cautious in implementing changes compared to the commercial sector. Reasons vary from massive legacy systems and tedious red-tape to budgetary and spending concerns that come with major technology overhauls. With the constant evolution of newer IT solutions gaining traction in the marketplace, adaptability is key, especially in expanding tech capabilities and finding newfound ways of embracing speed, connectivity, and long-term cost-efficiency. A solution that emphatically proved its value over the course of recent years is cloud services, particularly for increased data storage and accessibility. Moving to the cloud can be a daunting task that comes with a host of technology and personnel challenges, but if done correctly, offers innumerable benefits in the growth, productivity, and ultimately, cost-savings of any organization.

Rise of Cloud Migration Efforts

In recent years, the number of organizations across industries and service areas embracing cloud migration has increased significantly. With over 22% year over year growth, the market size for cloud migration services was valued at $11 billion in 2023, and is projected to reach about $60 billion by 2030. From healthcare and financial services to power/energy and transportation, adopters are finding tremendous value in supplementing or outright replacing on-prem systems for cloud computing services. A shortlist of benefits includes added data storage, security, accessibility, disaster recovery and sustainability. With cloud migration, organizations are greatly transforming their business operations and technical capabilities.

In the past, migrating to the cloud was more of a foreign process with limited market insights and case studies available. Although replacement of on-prem legacy systems still represent a noteworthy challenge, because of general cloud education and exposure, there’s a higher baseline of users already familiar with a variety of cloud services. You do not have to look any further than iCloud, DropBox, Google Drive, One Drive, etc., to understand the commercialization of cloud services, priming organizational users for cloud adoption.

With most users ready, what’s preventing organizations from migrating to cloud, and how can you best prepare your organization for this change-making move?

Cloud Migration Preparedness

Organizations must question their readiness and business goals when preparing to migrate to the cloud. Examine your exact needs and expectations in pursuing cloud services and forecast how these services will not only benefit your organization, but more pointedly, help accomplish desired business and technology outcomes set forth by your company. Aligning cloud adoption to specific end goals helps maximize capabilities and tailor overall strategy for implementing this powerful technology. Performing a SWOT analysis is a recommended first step to understanding the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats associated with cloud migration specific to your organization.

According to Gov Tech, government leaders in technology have cited several challenges with cloud adoption, including measuring ROI, proper security controls, upskilling staff, and complex legacy environments. Although these areas may cause legitimate concern, which requires collaboration from key IT and business stakeholders to address and navigate, it also presents an opportunity to improve and enhance organizational capabilities and efficiencies.

  • Return on Investment (ROI): Measuring ROI on cloud migrations is trickier than simply switching over and saving money. The establishment and/or maintenance of an on-prem data center must be compared to the pay-as-you-go subscription model of a third-party cloud service provider. On-prem environments require specialized licenses and data center resources to implement, monitor, and scale equipment, which may be a sizable expense depending on the organization. Whereas implementation and scaling with a cloud provider typically requires less upfront financial and planning commitments. To understand the true ROI of cloud migration, organizations must weigh the quantitative and qualitative returns they may gain against the cost of migration and historic investment into on-prem legacy systems.
  • Legacy Systems: At the heart of cloud migration is the transfer of legacy systems into a cloud environment. This includes components, controls, data, and other key enterprise architecture that must transition or evolve to fit cloud functionality. For Government organizations, tied to strict regulations and accountable to the needs of taxpayers, legacy systems have been deeply entrenched undergoing only incremental changes, and notably challenged against complete transformation. This apprehension may be due to the costs and labor of a large migration effort, with massive data loads and historical functionality at-risk. It may also be due to historic investment, the yearly budgets spent developing and maintaining on-prem systems, which must be substantially justified in the eyes of key stakeholders before transitioning to the cloud. Added to this concern may be strict guidelines around data control and the high need for customization. It leaves many Government organizations wondering, will a cloud migration be worth it?
  • Security: On-prem systems require in-house cybersecurity resources to monitor and respond to incidents that may occur, as well as maintain and update security software and protocols. This grants organizations full control over their security measures, personnel and strategy, but also full accountability if breached. In comparison, cloud systems are protected and managed by third-party service providers with minimal involvement from purchasers. Cloud security is marked by highly experienced resources alongside the latest deployment of cybersecurity controls and technologies such as automated response, business continuity/disaster recovery, artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Understanding your organizational infrastructure, performance goals, and compliance with regulatory requirements is central to knowing if cloud migration is the right move for you. Carefully analyze ROI, legacy systems and security controls to fully align your enterprise needs with cloud strategy. If you discover alignment between your organization and cloud services, there are a host of transformative migration strategies and benefits ready to be embraced.

Understanding Migration Strategies

Choosing the right migration strategy is a key component in ensuring a successful transition into the cloud. This determines the approach and scope of cloud adoption, tailored to the precise technology hardware and software infrastructure of your organization. These proven migration strategies include:

  • Lift and Shift: With this approach, IT systems are completely transferred to the cloud. This fully replaces on-prem infrastructure and moves organizations into the cloud entirely. Consider this strategy if you require minimal customization and would like a one-to-one of your current state on the cloud.
  • Application Evolution: This moves IT infrastructure to the cloud in a gradual progression, transferring data and systems chunk by chunk until satisfaction is reached. This hybrid approach allows for the simultaneous usage of cloud computing and on-prem systems for selected technologies and data.
  • Application Rearchitecting: If legacy systems require significant updating before a cloud migration, you may want to consider application rearchitecting. This includes rebuilding existing applications with modern advancements that allow for added scalability and agility. This also allows for a hybrid approach balanced between cloud and on-prem services, although organizations can also choose a complete transfer as well with this strategy.

Remember migration strategies are not one size fits all, and highly dependent on the structure and needs of your organization. As mentioned earlier, moving to the cloud can be a daunting task, that involves collaboration between key stakeholders, an organizational assessment, roadmap for execution, and the technical capability to make it happen. The good news is you do not have to approach it alone.

Importance of Finding a Trusted Partner

Identifying a trusted IT service partner can tremendously ease your cloud migration efforts and ensure the most appropriate migration strategy is implemented to achieve established business/technology expectations. At Seneca Resources, our experts have deep relationships with Government and Commercial organizations for robust IT services and solutions, including for cloud computing and related services such as cloud engineering, architecture and development. The firm is well versed in talent sourcing and project management which not only enables us to supplement workforces, but also manage project teams and oversee complex initiatives such as cloud migration for large organizations.

Through partnership with a service provider such as Seneca Resources, organizations can rest assured they are not alone and able to depend upon a proven delivery team with the ability to transpose complex goals into successful solutions customized to fit exact needs and capabilities.

If you are interested in learning more about the IT services and solutions provided by Seneca Resources, such as cloud computing and migration, please contact us at info@senecahq.com or 703-390-9099.

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