How to Pick the Right Number of IT Cloud Team Members
Coming up with a healthy, balanced ratio of the number of team members to number of clients is still a relatively subjective exercise. Not quite scientific yet. There are rules of thumb out there to start with, but it ultimately comes down to your requirements and the size of your B2B clients and B2C customer base. Also, the amount of request for new features or bug fixes spawns customer telemetry data that will factor into the ratio.
The following provides a rule of thumb starting point for your fine tuning needs based on personal observation in a consulting professional capacity over many years:
· Solution Architects: 1 for every set of 4 or 5 typical quarterly release projects or B2C clients
· Database Team: 1 to 5
· Networking Team: 1 to 5
· OS Sys Admin Team: 1 to 7
· Monitoring Team: 1 to 3
· Security: 1 to 5
· R&D: 1 to 10
Continuously capturing and tracking team role and skill inventory will help in determining these ratios, calibrating them over time.
Example Cloud Team Structure: Monitoring and Alerting
How many cloud monitoring team members do you need to support B2B corporate clients?
The number of cloud monitoring team members required to support B2B corporate clients can vary widely depending on the size and complexity of the clients, the scope of the services being offered, and the level of support required by the clients. However, some factors that can help determine the appropriate staffing levels for a cloud monitoring team might include:
1. Number and size of clients: The more clients you have and the larger their businesses are, the more team members you will likely need to support them effectively.
2. Service scope: The more services you offer and the more complex they are, the more team members you may need to monitor and maintain them.
3. Client service level agreements (SLAs): If your clients have SLAs that require a high level of service availability and response times, you may need more team members to meet these requirements.
4. Automated vs. manual monitoring: The more automated your monitoring is, the fewer team members you may need to support your clients.
With these factors in mind, a typical cloud monitoring team for a B2B corporate client might include anywhere from 5 to 15 team members, depending on the size and complexity of the clients being served. This team might include roles such as:
1. Cloud monitoring manager or team lead
2. Cloud monitoring engineers or technicians
3. Customer support specialists
4. Product Managers/Owners, Project managers or coordinators
Hope this helps give your sprint planning a starting point. Determining the optimal staffing levels for a cloud monitoring team relies on various factors that are unique to your organization and clients. I recommend you thoroughly evaluate your clients’ needs, including number of users and groups, and the level of assistance necessary to guarantee that you have the right staffing levels to deliver dependable and excellent services.
