pca1030

Selecting a Cloud Services Provider is undisputedly one of the single most important business decisions you will need to make … and get right. The course starts by looking at the Cloud from a control viewpoint: how much control do you need in the key areas of security, performance and availability. It then talks about how to select the initial workload(s) to move into the Cloud, and the first ten questions used to define the requirements on your Cloud Service Providers. It concludes with the "ABC"s of shopping for a Cloud Service Providers.

Course learning emphasis

Selecting a Cloud Services Provider (CSP) will undisputedly be one of the single most important business decisions you will need to make … and get right!

Forrester analyst James Staten predicts that many companies will go down the path of Cloud deployments and will fail. Staten said however that this experience should not be ignored … “This is a good thing. Because through this failure you will learn what it really takes to operate a Cloud environment. Knowing this, your strategy should be to fail fast and fail quietly.”

We disagree with Mr. Staten. We believe that you do not have to fail; and that you will leave the course with all the factual knowledge you need to substantially mitigate or remove the propensity for failure!

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Course objectives

• • Understanding of all the critical business criteria and components that encompass the effective choice of a CSP

  • The provision of systematic guidance to an all-encompassing and logically sequenced process that will greatly improve the outcome of your CSP selection to the benefit of your company

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Audience

• 1. Organizational leaders, executives and anyone who will be making decisions on establishing the criteria and process for selection of a Cloud Services Provider

  2. Anyone who will be involved in the preparation of your organizations RFP to prospective CSPs and those who will be decision-makers in the selection of the CSP

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Course prerequisites

It is strongly recommended that in the interest of optimal learning value retention that the participants on this course previously attended the Cloud’s Business Imperatives course.

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Course learning modules

1. Course goals and function

   1. Setting expectations and creating the learning environment to ensure that your CSP selection will significantly contribute to a successful Cloud Computing transition.

2. Basic Cloud knowledge review

• 1. Really understand what specifically each of the Cloud service models (PaaS, IaaS and SaaS) offers your business. Start to use your new knowledge to specifically categorize your major business issues:

     1. • Accounting (financial)

        • Aggravation (operations and management)

        • Agility (ability to react to opportunities and threats quickly)

3. How much control do you need?

• 1. Understanding the three critical issues of security, performance and availability. You will have exactly the same security requirements in the Cloud; the Cloud “simply” changes the where, how, and who of access to your data. Understand the implications of the 10 business requirements questions and start to think of how you will need to use them in your organization.

4. Selecting workloads

• 1. The Cloud is not yet ready for everything, so you do need to be careful in selecting what moves to the Cloud now. Get suggestions for selecting the 1st workload based upon clear measurable business benefit (cost savings, reduced aggravation, better agility), with a low risk of damaging the business.

5. Building requirements

• 1. The 10 questions in this module are a logical and all-encompassing way to gather and understand all the decision criteria and data elements vital to the development of an effective CSP selection exercise. You will really explore and understand the service and support levels your business must have.

6. Selecting Cloud Service Providers (CSPs)

• 1. Understand and apply the “ABCs of shopping for CSPs”. The CSP is your key partner in the journey to the Cloud and must provide cost savings and increased agility while maintaining appropriate levels of security, performance and uptime at a hopefully, low risk to your business. Pay attention to the “let the buyer be wary” advice in this module.

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Course delivery logistics

The Selecting a Cloud Services Provider course can be delivered in any of our standard delivery options.