The Intentional Hybrid Cloud
I’ve been hearing the word “intentional” more and more frequently when it comes to talking about clouds, multi clouds, hybrid clouds. Let’s face it, every single business on the planet already has or is going to have more than one cloud where they run parts of their business. It may be a cloud for the third-party software as a service, it may be a cloud where they run internal custom developed business applications, it may be a public cloud where advanced AI capabilities are used as a platform service, it may be a private cloud for your most secure business secrets.
The key, though, isn’t simply about having many different clouds, some of the public, some of them private. It is about having an intentional hybrid cloud. Intentional about why you’re using hybrid and intentional about how you’re delivering value from your hybrid cloud. And intentional in being able to articulate that value.
In the most fundamental sense, intentional means taking control. Some of you may say “sure Matt, easy for you to say take control”. You have the fancy tools to be able to do that and you have the senior level leaders in your organization, sanctioning taking control, but I have a different situation. I have cloud sprawl all over the place and no guardrails, it’s hard, yadda yadda yadda…
But that’s the point, isn’t it? Every organization has started out its cloud journey and simultaneously begets speed and complexity. In some sense it is a sisyphean task to reduce the complexity, however, if you can establish the necessary intentions around the purposeful use of these tools, you accelerate the velocity of value.
How have we tried to be intentional with our hybrid cloud? Three specific ways:
- We’re clear on why we have many clouds. The SaaS we use, our private cloud and our specific use of public cloud have defined purposes.
- We’re clear on what we use the clouds for. From specific business functions and business capabilities, to where data can and cannot reside, to specific technical services we use on which cloud.
- We’re clear on how we operate in a consistent, secure, compliant manner relevant for our business. This is what takes many clouds to hybrid cloud.
Hopefully what you’ve seen here over the weeks scaling CI/CD pipelines to make it easier for teams to use your hybrid cloud with the intended intent, quantitatively measuring hybrid cloud value, cloud “smart” migration, or simply illustrating a few ways that we have tried to be intentional with our hybrid cloud, and what we have learned as trying to do that. Every organization’s intentional hybrid cloud journey is going to be a little bit different.
So take control. Don’t let the cloud providers dictate what you do. Be intentional. That’s how you amplify the value you deliver through your hybrid cloud.
Matt Lyteson is Vice President of CIO Hybrid Cloud Platforms at IBM based in RTP, North Carolina. The above article is personal and does not necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.
