08 Nov 2022
by Verity Greig

Transitioning Your Solutions from On-Premise to a Multi-Cloud Platform. (Guest blog from TCS)

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Author: Verity Greig, Cloud Evangelist, TCS

Introduction

First, a quick reminder of the benefits of migrating on-premise workloads to the cloud:

  • Release citizen-facing apps in a single click, remove the need for multi-layer approvals
  • Access to the latest technology. In the cloud you can be assured of high application performance.
  • Improve service uptime helping reduce citizen and employee frustration
  • Unlock insight through a single source of truth

Migrating to Multi-Cloud

Here are the guiding principles to take to smoothly migrate applications to multi-cloud.

Implement collaborative governance. Appoint a Steering Committee. Schedule regular progress discussions, highlight risks and call out information needed. Define an Acceptance Process. Acceptance criteria should include the required performance levels and the required functionality.

Gain a deep knowledge of business dependencies to ensure a seamless experience for employees and citizens during the transition

Assess and categorise the applications and services you are going to migrate. Use the 5R methodology - Retire, Rehost, Refactor, Rebuild and Replace.  Thorough assessment can be achieved through interaction with application support teams to gather knowledge through a series of workshops and by shadowing the team.

Use a project plan to detail dependencies, thus mitigating risks in migration. Your project plan will enable you to visualise timelines, milestones and track progress. Publish your project plan to enable collaboration across your move groups.  Your project plan will give you end-to-end clarity about what to do in which order.

Form Move Group Teams, and for applications that are tightly integrated, ensure these teams work in parallel.  Move the services into your development/acceptance environment first and once testing is signed off, deploy the service in the production environment.

Follow regular sprint cycles and share status dashboards throughout the cycles.  Highlight progress status and potential blockers that need addressing, monitor milestones and call out dependencies when needed.

Introduce Changes into Live Environment in Agile manner. Use a DevOps tool to manage your agile approach.  This will allow your teams to plan work, collaborate on code development, and build and deploy applications.

Use all the latest technologies embedded in the Cloud to make the path smooth.  Technologies such as serverless to provision code without provisioning infrastructure. Containerisation for easier application lift and shift.  Cost Management for recommendations on cost optimisation.

Don’t forget to benefit from loyalty offers and discounts from the Cloud provider making it more cost effective for you.

Conclusion

If your organisation is reticent to move some applications to the cloud, start with a business case. Demonstrate cost savings, carbon reduction, highlight the risks of continuing with an on-prem environment, and demonstrate that CAPEX saved in IT can be used for real world projects that directly benefit the citizens you serve.

Imagine your organisation in 2030.  Will you be Cloud Native, running applications designed for continuous change and improvement?

Find out more at TCS!

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Chris Hazell

Chris Hazell

Programme Manager - Cloud, Tech and Innovation, techUK

Sue Daley

Sue Daley

Director, Technology and Innovation

Laura Foster

Laura Foster

Head of Technology and Innovation, techUK

Authors

Verity Greig

Verity Greig

Cloud Evangelist, TCS

I’m a Leader who believes that technology can be a force for good for Public Services. As a Cloud Evangelist, I have the privilege of leading TCS' cloud strategy for the UK Public Sector.  Recently TCS was named the Number One IT Services Provider in the UK by TechMarketView.  A moment of pride for us but also a moment of obligation. Prior to that I was an Azure Product Manager at Microsoft tailoring the Azure service to meet Public Sector needs. As the mum of two daughters, I’m particularly passionate about inspiring more women into STEM industries.