Cloud Adoption Drivers are not what is being Reported:
We talk a lot now about the Cloud and its drivers and barriers. These two new studies shed interesting light on the topics. However, I’m motivated to point out one glaring and important point of interpretation. It is about cost. Every study says cost as in “cost reduction” is the top driver. In my experience, we’ve seen this opinion and misleading conclusion many times before. Be careful.
The two reports are:
a] IBM: “Inside_the_Midmarket__Global_Report”_201101 – a study of cloud adoption in the midmarket
b] IBM: “The evolving role of IT managers and CIOs Findings from the 2010 IBM Global IT Risk Study”
MY OPINION:
Cost is an “eliminator” in the selection process, not a “selector” until you get to the end of the purchasing process. (Usually, #7 on the prioritized list of selectors.) Consequently, if you ask a CXO the typical ‘leading’ questions in surveys you will get cost back at the top of the list, but be careful, you will potentially interpret this incorrectly and be mislead.
Cost has historically proven itself to be much less of a driver than the vendor community wants to believe. We have many historical examples of this occurring. I think the same applies to Cloud adoption. Its an eliminator and until the “selectors” fall into line. Cloud storage especially will still be too much risk to let cost be the primary driver. All I’m saying is that you need to be looking to address the real barriers to adoption instead of focusing on cost. Focus instead on proper “customer development” practices.