Do you feel as though your organization isn't quite ready for a transition to the cloud? ERP solutions are often the building block of a company's IT infrastructure, and even today a significant amount of businesses keep their product either fully on-premise or as a software-as-a-service deployment. As of 2015, only 11% of organizations had committed to a fully hosted and managed cloud ERP solution.
What Is Keeping Organizations from Cloud-Readiness?
Every organization is different -- but when approaching certain technologies, there are trends that emerge. Your business could fall into a few common categories that is preventing it from true "cloud-readiness":
- Lack of understanding regarding the cloud's offerings. This does not indicate any lack of knowledge within the company, merely a lack of experience with the cloud itself. There has been a significant amount of misinformation and misunderstandings regarding this new technology. Without enough knowledge, decision makers within an organization will not see any value in switching to a cloud ERP platform, especially if their current ERP solution is "good enough."
- Concerns regarding cloud security. Security concerns are understandable; there were many high-profile critiques regarding cloud security during the technology's infancy. Today, cloud solutions are no less secure than traditional in-house systems. In fact, the solutions themselves were never inherently less secure, it was only a matter of user error with a new and not yet fully understood technology.
- Fear of data loss or other data-related issues. Data concerns are always at the forefront of considerations during any sort of data migration. However, cloud solutions actually vastly reduce the risk of data loss, through redundant systems and methods of control.
In general, many organizations may find themselves "not ready" for cloud ERP because they don't understand why the cloud might benefit their organization and because they fear the potential consequences of change.
How Can Organizations Achieve Cloud-Readiness?
By educating themselves on the cloud, most organizations will find that they are, in fact, "cloud ready" -- even if they didn't think that they were. Cloud solutions have been shown to outperform in-house resources in a variety of ways: reducing IT budgets, increasing data security, and improving overall organizational efficiency and productivity. Companies that complete their own due diligence regarding issues such as system security and data fidelity should not encounter any significant issues throughout the transition.
Any shift in IT infrastructure can seem intimidating, especially when it has to do with a core resource such as an ERP solution. Nevertheless, there are some substantial benefits to the cloud that can aid a business in not only growing but also besting the competition. With only approximately 10% of organizations switching over to cloud ERP solutions, companies now have the opportunity to differentiate themselves through innovation and early adoption.
Sources: ,
By
