Empowering Yourself in the Cloud

With so much hype and so many different ways of describing the cloud, people are left feeling scared and confused.   Ian Moyse, U.K. sales director, Workbooks.com, believes that we shouldn’t be scared of the cloud and instead ask ourselves the simple question if cloud can help.  Moyse has found that by trying one cloud-based application that genuinely helps us means we are far more likely to become “cloud committed.”

Moyse has more than 26 years IT experience, sits on the board of Eurocloud UK, has a seat on the governance board of Cloud Industry Forum (CIF), is an advisory board member of SaasMax and is the first person in the U.K. to pass the CompTIA Cloud Essentials exam.  And yet, even with this enviable list of achievements, Moyse is still constantly learning about the cloud.

It may come as a surprise that many of us are using cloud-based services without consciously knowing it. Take for example iTunes which has revolutionized the delivery model for the music industry.  You don’t have to buy the album before you have heard it.   You don’t have to buy the entire album; you just buy the songs you want.   And you can buy, rent and share the music, television shows, books and movies you want wherever you are, whenever you want them.

While there are huge benefits to be had with the cloud, there are still many challenges for both individuals and their organizations.  The biggest end-user concern about the adoption of the cloud in their business is security closely followed by reliability.

Other challenges with the cloud include:
•       Lack of understanding,
•       Bottom up adoption causing internal conflict,
•       Ad hoc standards (e.g. SaS-70, ISO, CIF, Open Cloud Consortium),
•       Vendor management becoming contract/service level management,
•       Network latency in the backbone infrastructure, and
•       Choosing business value over form factor (i.e. the ‘next big thing’ syndrome).

With cloud technologies, job roles and skills will be (and are) changing.   While cloud does change the role of IT, it does NOT replace it.  Smart organizations and individuals are empowering themselves by embracing cloud and undertaking training and certification in order to gain cloud skills and competencies that enhance their current and future career prospects.

For those who want to learn more about the cloud, Moyse recommends The Big Switch by Nicolas Carr.