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CIOs See Value of Cloud Business, Not Worried About Cloud Expertise

The business value of cloud continues to serve as a major driver of cloud adoption across organizations, with 80 percent of business executives citing better value as a key driver for choosing cloud applications, according to a new industry study.

The survey, which was conducted by Dimensional Research (and sponsored by Host Analytics), also found the majority of IT executives say they’re having no problems finding the skills they need to move forward with cloud engagements. But, will this confidence be sustainable as organizations move deeper into cloud? 

Cloud applications offer a range of potential advantages over on-premise applications – from reduced costs to simplifying maintenance to enabling compliance, there are many reasons to choose a cloud application, according to Diane Hagglund, senior research analyst for Dimensional Research and the study’s author.

“Our survey findings show business value is an overwhelming driver for cloud adoption among business executives, while CIOs cite a range of reasons for moving to the cloud,” Hagglund said in a statement. “Better compliance and increased competitive advantage were also identified as key drivers.”

While value was the priority among a majority of business executives, it was less so for CIOs (53 percent) who listed a range of reasons for moving to the cloud, including compliance requirements (58 percent) and competitive advantage (51 percent).

These results infer that business executives place a significant amount of weight on business value over functionality in IT decisions, which is of greater concern to CIOs and other IT professionals. While CIOs appear confident in being able to subscribe to services as needed and leaving the technical details to cloud service providers, this level of certainty could dwindle as organizations move deeper into cloud engagement, points out Forbes contributor Joe McKendrick.

“We are still in the early stages of cloud, and the challenges of moving large, core applications such as enterprise resource planning and financials to more virtualized or cloud settings are still ahead of us,” McKendrick wrote. “The actual coding and underlying systems development work may be once-removed, but there will be a growing need for skilled people who can help address configurations, data models and process flows, as it all fits into the enterprise.”

Other survey findings show that employees like using modern, cloud applications, particularly those in IT. The vast majority of CIOs – 95 percent – reported that their employees perceived the ability to gain expertise with modern cloud applications as beneficial. Additionally CIOs acknowledged that they could easily find help for cloud applications (83 percent). 

The survey also uncovered outdated on-premise software is common, with 61 percent of respondents reporting they have business-critical software that has not been upgraded recently. This presents significant missed business opportunity in leveraging the cloud to fill the void in ensuring use of the most to-do date critical applications. 

“Businesses are embracing the cloud and realizing it offers tremendous value and advantages over on-premise applications,” said Keri Brooke, vice president of marketing at Host Analytics. “This new research reinforces the industry’s shift to a more modern, effective and safe way of doing business. Sixty one percent of survey respondents cited critical business applications hadn’t been updated recently. That’s appalling and a ‘thing of the past’ when you move to the cloud.”

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