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The Dangers of Unmanaged Clouds: Page 2 of 2

The survey indicates that IT is losing control of the situation and becoming less relevant to business operations, at least as far as the cloud is concerned. Simply put, if a business unit can get what it needs from a cloud services provider, it will most likely circumvent IT and IT policies to gain access to what is viewed as mission critical computing services.

However, there is a light at the end of the tunnel for internal IT departments: 81% of respondents said that a comprehensive cloud strategy is a high priority for the next year. Nonetheless, the question remains: Will internal IT manage that cloud strategy, or will it be supplanted by a different corporate entity? "This is a wake-up call," Singer says. "They know that this is going on and they understand that cloud is a way to go around monolithic IT."

Traditionally, cost has been a major driver in the C-suite, yet the cloud is even shifting perceptions there as well; survey respondents placed a much lower priority on cost and escalated the importance of higher availability, faster delivery of services, more agility, and options and flexibility.

While the research indicates that traditional IT may have a rough time combating cloud adoption, there is still hope for IT to remain relevant to the business units supported. The researchers recommend that IT takes a three-pronged approach to getting a handle on cloud implications:

*Build trust with the users and create a better user experience: Have an honest conversation about needs of the business, incorporate business requirements into a cloud strategy, and demonstrate progress toward them.

*Shift from unmanaged to managed public cloud services: Many cloud vendors allow IT operations to monitor and manage services. This will help mitigate the risk and complexity that unmanaged clouds now introduce.

*Develop ways to provision and operate internal services so that users get experiences similar to those they get from outside. This requires more automation to rapidly deploy solutions.

It is imperative that IT gets control of cloud services and overcomes the perception that the cloud is a way to subvert monolithic IT. Much like the dinosaurs, IT will have to evolve or perish, at least when it comes to the cloud.

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