A successful migration to the cloud starts with a complete migration plan. But writing that plan isn’t the first step of a transition to cloud. Due diligence requires that before writing the migration plan, businesses should complete a detailed discovery and assessment process to ensure they understand what they intend to migrate, what they hope to gain from the migration, and what they need to acquire in the cloud to obtain those benefits.
That information then allows businesses to create a business case for the migration that specifies the objectives of the migration, how cloud will meet those objectives, and how that will be measured. The cloud provider’s ability to meet those capabilities for each workload can be assessed, and the business can define a cloud operating model that documents how business workflows and processes will be impacted by the cloud.
Aspects of Cloud Discovery and Assessment
There are three main aspects that should be evaluated as part of the assessment, each covering multiple considerations:
1. Discovery and Inventory
Both hardware and software inventories need to be created or updated to have a complete understanding of existing infrastructure. The discovery process should uncover shadow IT resources to ensure a full understanding of how users work with their IT capabilities.
2. Analysis
Once all assets are identified, they need to be understood. This analysis must cover numerous aspects, including performance, dependencies, and cloud readiness. Assets that require remediation before migrating to cloud also need to be documented. A financial analysis to evaluate cloud costs and compare to data center benchmarks provides key data for making decisions about cloud usage.
3. Cloud Model
Map the assets to the most appropriate cloud model, either Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), or Software as a Service (SaaS).
Benefits of Cloud Discovery and Assessment
By taking the time to complete a cloud discovery and assessment process before beginning detailed cloud migration planning, businesses achieve a number of benefits, including:
Risk Reduction
With a deeper understanding of the workloads to be migrated to cloud, migration plans can be more appropriate and more detailed.
Better Vendor Selection
Understanding the needs of workloads and their costs allows businesses to select the cloud vendor that delivers the needed technology at the best price.
Better Migration Planning
The cloud discovery and assessment process offers a comprehensive picture of existing infrastructure, allowing the migration plan to more effectively meet application needs.
VAST IT Services offers a cloud discovery and assessment process as part of its complete set of cloud services. From cloud adoption to cloud support, VAST IT Services helps our clients make successful transitions to cloud. Contact us to learn more about how to use insights from our cloud discovery process to guide your cloud migration.
