- Another change in the overall technology landscape
is both a disrupter and an enabler.
Let's talk about the cloud.
I know some people are still a little bit trepidatious
about the whole idea but the reality is
that the cloud is having a major impact
on the digital transformation of business.
First of all, it's changing the traditional hardware
heavy approach to technology.
It feels like everyone is moving data storage to the cloud
although that might just be my perception.
But the fact is that having your data online
goes a long way in making it easier to access and share it.
There are big savings available to companies
who stop buying housing and maintaining physical servers
in favor of virtual ones.
Money that can be spent on better things.
Then, there's software as a service, SaaS.
Using applications that live online
instead of on an individual user computer.
Things like Office 365, G Suite, Salesforce and Cisco Webex
are making it easier and cheaper
to get employees up and running
since there's a lot less setup
that IT departments need to do.
It also makes maintenance simpler
since it's the provider
who does all updates, patches and so on.
Typically, all the IT department has to do
is monitor releases for possible conflicts.
The provider has done all the heavy lifting
before making the changes live online.
And once again, it makes the applications
available from any device connected to the internet
which creates more opportunities for a remote workforce.
There's also platform as a service or PasS.
Now this can get a little tricky
since the concept is still evolving.
But generally, you can think of PasS
as providing development tools
and environments online so that developers
have a common area to work in.
There's some debate over whether Amazon AWS
is a platform or a service, or an infrastructure.
I think it probably depends what you're using it for.
But at its highest utilization, I go with platform.
AWS gives you the tools and ability
to develop complete solutions in a safe environment
and then roll them out to your users when you're ready.
The point to all this is clear, though.
All these different web services
fundamentally change the role of the in-house IT department.
When company resources aren't spending their time
on day-to-day installation and maintenance of hardware,
applications, and development tools,
they can be focusing on new horizons
and be a moving force behind the organization's
overall digital transformation.
If you'd like more information
about how the cloud is affecting business,
you might want to check out Learning Cloud Computing:
Core Concepts in the online course library.