What IT Empathy Looks Like in Cloud Migrations

Close collaboration between IT and business is critical for successful cloud adoption. Businesses should be involved from the very beginning when considering cloud priorities and goals, and even the cloud service provider. 

Aligning cloud decisions with business priorities and the organization’s overall goals interconnects stakeholders and helps shape effective decision-making. Further, different parts of the technology organization must also communicate to ensure cloud strategy syncs with other technology strategies, including those relating to data management, cybersecurity, core systems architecture, and others.

Apart from alignment on “hard” strategic initiatives, a significant benefit of cooperation is that it can create empathy among IT for the business’s needs, which are often not articulated clearly. Instead of simply asking the business for their requirements, IT should acquire first-hand an understanding of their biggest problems, needs, and pain points. An empathetic IT will likely make the right migration decisions — such as what workloads to prioritize or what strategies to employ (rehost, refactor, re-platform, retire, etc.) — and thereby earn the trust of the business.

No Room for Isolation

However, the reality is that many organizations make cloud decisions in silos. The retail industry is an early adopter on its way to cloud maturity. Yet, the recent Infosys Cloud Radar: CPG and Retail Industry Report reveals that 44% of organizations in this vertical make cloud decisions in isolation (28% said the IT group alone decided; 16% said the business alone made decisions). Accordingly, there appears to be a lack of overarching strategic thinking in the respondent organizations.

Other differences may also be coming in the way of IT-business alignment. For example, one study noted that the IT team overestimated the business’ understanding of the benefits of moving to the cloud because the business did not appreciate the cloud’s full potential; they were unprepared for the budgetary allocation, new ways of working, and the culture change required for cloud and taken for granted by their IT co-workers. 

Unaware of the sophisticated security measures offered by major providers, business leaders were also concerned about protecting customer data and other sensitive information on the cloud. 

These differences can be ironed out through seamless communication between IT and business. This communication should originate from the top, between CEOs and CIOs/CTOs. Although the cloud conversation began many years ago, and grew urgent during the pandemic, many organizations have yet to achieve meaningful levels of adoption. The responsibility for this lies, at least partly, with the CEO. At a time when CIOs and CTOs are racing to carry the digitization momentum from the pandemic years forward, only the CEO can clear their path by approving the necessary resources, spearheading change management, and bringing the executive leadership across functions — finance, HR, risk and compliance, etc. — together in support of cloud transformation goals.