Managing the Tornado of Change

How competent are businesses in effectively managing tornado of change in cloud computing, which is well into its second decade as a mainstream technology?

Companies, particularly those attempting to use the cloud in so many ways, have had a difficult time adjusting to the distinct management style that cloud services require. To exploit the capabilities and services provided by the cloud and manage the connection with providers, business and IT leaders must be upskilled. This is being addressed by ITIL 4 at the moment with the ITIL 4 Specialist: Acquiring & Managing Cloud Services module.

According to research, just approximately one-third of businesses adopting the cloud are succeeding in accomplishing their goals, such as lowering costs, speeding up processes, or starting new businesses.

The problem is that IT companies frequently try to control the cloud in the same manner they manage their own devices. With cloud computing, you purchase a service rather than actual hardware, and you are unaware of the devices.

Businesses are also discovering that administering a technology-based service requires more work than they initially thought it would, such as managing the configuration of SaaS services across multiple versions. No business is general; it wants to do unique things, which requires a lot of maintenance and upgrades. The cloud offers commoditized and generic services and applications. And doing so requires investing in the technological resources they were attempting to avoid.

Additionally, from the standpoint of cyber security, protecting devices differs from protecting access to services. Although cloud services are built with security in mind, no security can be taken for granted. To ensure that services are configured, managed, and used securely, consumers must continue to adapt and implement security policies. This requires specialized knowledge and abilities that aren’t usually present in an organization.

Tornado of Change: Real-world effects of the challenges of cloud computing

These difficulties in acquiring and maintaining cloud services are causing enterprises to face practical problems, including:

• In one example, a business purchased a cloud application development platform as a service. The business discovered it was paying for the cloud during the weekends when no one was working because it is a “pay as you use” approach. However, this was a result of no one at the company being aware that the service could be turned off. Once they did, they were able to save a significant sum of money.
• Another illustration shows how a medical research group began keeping data in the cloud for a small fraction of the expense it had previously. But after two years, the spending had doubled. This resulted from users storing duplicate information and having real-time access to archived data due to a lack of strict data governance, which drove up prices.

Tornado of Change: The cloud extension module for ITIL 4

The ITIL 4 Specialist: Acquiring & Managing Cloud Services module returns the attention to the fundamentals of the cloud as a standardized service that is not infinitely changeable to educate those who are acquiring cloud services.

Equipment needed becomes commonplace as innovation picks up speed. For instance, servers were very diverse from one another, and the hardware you utilized mattered a lot. Virtual servers are being offered as commodities by cloud services, and the consumer is unaware of the underlying hardware.

As a result, the ITIL 4 module’s skills and expertise focus on management, or how to create a cloud strategy, rather than the technical side of things. Here, the focus is on changing the expectation from obtaining custom solutions to receiving standardized ones that may be used in a variety of ways.

Additionally, the operating strategies of businesses and the automation of some processes must be examined. How does the warehouse tornado change, for instance, if a corporation switches its inventory management system to the cloud? These are important inquiries.

Considering risks, such as unrestricted use of cloud services and the procedures you need to handle it, is another aspect of having the correct knowledge. For instance, business users need the discipline to manage services efficiently if they interact with cloud providers directly (rather than through the IT department), therefore they should understand the fundamentals of technology management.

People can now navigate the tornado of change and manage how cloud and on-premise IT are interacting thanks to ITIL 4. Because it emphasizes the interaction between service providers and users/customers, ITIL is appropriate for this.

Because every cloud transaction is billable and prices will rise if workload accelerates, ITIL’s service management disciplines, such as workload management, are important.

Developing IT service management and management professionals

People who took the initial ITIL 4 Specialist: Acquiring & Managing Cloud Services courses commented, “I wish I had known this six months ago,” indicating a definite need for assistance in addressing the issues that cloud computing has brought about.

Every IT or business executive must possess some essential skills, one of which is the ability to handle cloud services. The ITIL curriculum is therefore intended for executives who have an increasing need to manage technology in the cloud and need the skills and mentality to do so.

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