How the Cloud is Enabling Strategic Thinking

We have already discussed in the article 'IT Needs To Get Closer To The Business' how CFOs are taking an ever increasing role in shaping the IT in organisations and how CIOs needs to better understand the needs of the business to begin to regain some control. But there is now a school of thought that the adoption of cloud computing will finally allow IT to become more strategic.

There is little doubt that cloud computing is going to bring down the per-unit price of computing, but one of the big advantages it offers is of allowing the IT department to move its attention from low level maintenance to more strategic thinking. This means that IT can start to get closer to the business and start showing its true value to the organization.

There have been quite a few surveys recently from various independent analyst companies that have shown that organizations are seeing agility and the ability to respond quickly and effectively to the changing demands of the business as one of the key drivers for the moving to the cloud. Baring in mind that the majority of the IT budget is spent on day-to-day operations that don't contribute to business growth, it makes sense that reducing these costs enables a bigger focus on strategy.

It is true that a move to the cloud will to pose many challenges to IT staff - retraining, some positions ceasing to exist and the demands on IT staff moving from technical to business aligned. But it's these sort of changes, because of the cloud, that will allow IT to deliver real tangible value to the business.