Survey Shows That Most Managers Now Think Cloud By Default

The findings of a recent survey of 1,850 senior managers across four continents has shown that more than half of enterprises would now choose the cloud by default for their for business application rollouts. This marks another important step for the cloud as more businesses embrace its benefits.

Shift To Cloud-First Model

The survey by CSP ServiceNow found that not only do 52% of managers prefer the cloud to less secure and more costly on-premise data centres, but three quarters of the senior managers surveyed also expect to see a clear shift to a cloud-first model in the next two years.

The Influence of DevOps

One of the main reasons given by most of the managers surveyed for their vision of a cloud-first model being on the horizon is the effect that their own involvement in DevOps has had on their outlook.

DevOps is a culture and practice that links disciplines from development and operations and encourages collaboration and communication between software developers and other IT professionals.  Born out of agile operations, the aim and outcomes centre on being able to build, and operate evolving and rapidly-changing resilient systems at scale.  The collaborative and efficiency aspects of the cloud have therefore been important in allowing this to happen, and perhaps in enabling the managers in the ServiceNow survey to see the vital contribution that the cloud has made to success in DevOps.

Could Replace the IT Department…Some of the Time for Now

One interesting opinion expressed in the survey was that nearly 90% of the managers surveyed thought that the cloud could actually replace a formal IT department for at least some of the time.  The survey also reveals that as well as being based upon a practical viewpoint, the vision of needing less of an IT department may also be linked to a lack of confidence in the ability of in-house IT staff.  For example the survey showed that nine out ten of companies that had already moved to a cloud-first model thought that their current IT staff lacked the required skill sets to be successful.

This lack of confidence in a company’s in-house IT staff where keeping up with cloud developments is concerned highlights why outsourced IT and cloud support are now so important to so many companies.

A survey last year for example by Whitelane Research in collaboration with PA Consulting Group showed that 69 % of companies intended to continue to outsource IT contracts at the same or increased rate.

The Cloud Contributes to 360 Business View

It is clear from this survey that mangers are now seeing the cloud as the natural choice going forward, and as a major opportunity for the future success of their business. With 6 out of 10 mangers looking for 360 degree visibility for their business, the results of this survey show that the vast majority of managers see the cloud-first model as being central to achieving this.