If you are a business leader holding back from migrating your operation to the cloud because of things you have heard, then it’s time to set the record straight. There is plenty of misinformation floating around about the cloud that needs to be challenged.
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These myths are preventing some businesses from transforming their business model, making them more economical, efficient and secure through cloud computing.
Myth one: The cloud is wide open to hacking
Cloud infrastructure provides a safe, walled virtual fortress and when you sign up to a cloud service, your data belongs to you – it’s that simple. The weakest points to any cloud infrastructure are the users themselves. Authentication of users is something that your business can control with simple, effective work policies. Password allocation from management ensures robust passwords are always used. Multiple stage authentication can also be used if security is perceived as an issue. You can educate your staff about phishing scams and how to spot them. Mobile device users also need to adhere to policies of use which are freely available online. This is simple gatekeeping stuff – it’s not rocket science. Just as with any kind of work you want to keep safe, if you are mindful of protecting it, it will remain protected.
Myth two: You have to migrate all of your IT to the cloud
There seems to be a common perception that it’s all or nothing when engaging with cloud infrastructure as a service. The truth is that it’s largely up to you how you use the cloud for your business. You can choose to use it for a variety of operations and virtual software – perhaps for emails, or for sharing and working on documents but not for your main databases. The point is, you do not necessarily have to shift your whole organisation to the cloud if that’s not comfortable for you. A hybrid solution might serve your company better than a total migration.
Myth three: Your company is too large for migration
There is plenty of support out there for businesses wanting help with migration to the cloud – in CloudMigrator365 we have helped some of the largest and most recognisable companies in the World to migrate. Breaking migration into manageable stages is a good way to approach shifting a large organisation over to the cloud. Careful planning and project management takes much of the stress away. A well thought out, planned migration will make cloud infrastructure much easier to implement, with minimum disruption to staff.
Myth four: Your team will need to relearn everything
Office 365 has applications like Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint and SharePoint that will be familiar to your team, making uptake much easier. Whilst the software consists of the tools you will be familiar with, it will also benefit your work with additional productivity and collaboration tools that are available within Office 365.
The software you know is the same or similar, it’s just cloud-based and a lot more versatile. You could say that the cloud isn’t about reinventing the wheel – it’s just making that wheel go further.
Myth five: Moving over to the cloud is expensive
Nothing could be further from the truth. Migration costs are surprisingly affordable and the ongoing licensing costs typically save businesses money in a couple of distinct ways. Firstly, by driving efficiencies and savings compared to on-premise infrastructure, meaning that the vast majority of business will quickly see a return on the investment. Secondly, by ensuring that you don’t lose data and can recover quickly with your data remaining intact when systems go wrong or if there is a workplace disaster.
Darren Mawhinney is managing director of global cloud migration and management company CloudMigrator365 which has successfully migrated over six million people to the cloud across 57 countries worldwide.