
Virtualization and Cloud executives share their predictions for 2014. Read them in this VMblog.com series exclusive.
Contributed article by Somesh Singh Vice President, Product Management and Engineering at NetIQ
Make Your Cloud Conversations More Meaningful in 2014
Cloud computing has clear
advantages: speed of deployment, flexibility, reduction in management costs,
scalability of services and others. While these benefits may seem self-evident
to technologists and engineers, there is a widening gap between the language of
IT professionals and business users when it comes to understanding the value
cloud delivers to the organization.
After many, many conversations with
stakeholders in both camps this year, I strongly believe that 2014 must be the
year that mainstream CIOs communicate about the cloud in terms of delivering
business value to the organization. Discussions with business users are
peppered with concepts like "capacity on demand" or "capex versus opex" to try
and make the topic more accessible to a less technical audience. Although these
efforts are admirable, business users are uninterested in these topics. Instead,
they are worried about the running of their business. What they want is to hear
about the clear, demonstrable benefits of IT. They want things made
better and cheaper. They need services easily tailored and delivered to meet
customers' needs and demands to ensure they have the best possible experience.
They require operations to run more efficiently. They also want company and
customer data to be properly protected, at all times. Ultimately, they want a
healthier bottom line to the balance sheet and they need to hear a concrete
explanation about how the cloud will make this possible.
While business users generally care
neither about how services are delivered nor how the security of those services
are maintained, they care deeply about the impact those services have on their
business. Poor choices in the move to cloud, or poor security once you are
there, absolutely undermine the credibility of cloud and the CIOs that lead
their businesses to it.
In 2014, all technologists must
make the transition to communicating with business users in business terms -
both the opportunities and risks of trends like cloud computing in language that
reflect the actual business impact they will have. CIOs that can provide
meaningful advice to their line-of-business colleagues in order to empower their
business will be those that are able to fully claim a seat at the strategic
table - now and in the future.
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About the Author
Somesh Singh is responsible for driving
development and innovation efforts at NetIQ. Somesh leads the product
management, engineering and architecture teams. Somesh joined NetIQ in 2011
after serving as the senior vice president of Research and Development and
Technical Operations for Vignette Corporation, where he was responsible for all
product management, engineering, Professional Services, customer support and IT
operations. Previously, Somesh spent nine years at BMC Software and twelve years
with IBM in a variety of executive and professional positions.