Cloud computing and as-a-service solutions are no longer new. According to Flexera’s global State of the Cloud study for 2024, around 61% of small and medium enterprise (SME) workloads and 60% of SMB data are already in the public cloud. The question that SMEs face is whether they have unlocked the full value of their cloud deployments.
After the rapid digitalisation of the COVID era and years of ad hoc adoption of cloud platforms, many SMEs could benefit from taking a step back to assess how well their cloud deployments are working for them. Here are some principles that SME owners and managers could embrace to maximise the value of their cloud investments.
- Take a strategic view of where you want your ICT solutions to take your business
Over the years, many SMEs have embraced infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) and software-as-a-service (SaaS) offerings in a tactical manner. While this approach has been effective in addressing operational needs, SMEs can unlock even more value by taking a step back to ask what they want to achieve from IT in general and the cloud in particular.
It can be a valuable exercise to relook your business goals and how well your current tech environment supports your strategy. Are you able to support needs such as enabling remote work? Is it easy for you to collaborate with business partners? And are you able to use analytics to make quicker and better decisions?
- Identify the business and technology pain points
Following a strategic assessment of your IT environment, you can consider where your current business and technology pain points are. This will help you to create a roadmap for cloud migration that prioritises areas where you can make near-immediate improvements to tech performance.
For example, you might find that your small IT department is spending a lot of its time supporting a server running your enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. It might benefit you to move that workload to the cloud to save money and free time up for your in-house team to focus on strategy and innovation.
- Identify a partner that understands your business needs
While it has become simple to buy cloud services with a credit card, it’s not always as quick and easy to choose the right solution for your needs, configure it and get it to work well with other applications you have in place. A partner with expertise in SMEs in your industry can help you to choose and deploy the right platforms for your business. Such a partner can also back you up with a reliable support infrastructure.
- Build digital skills and awareness in your team
Strategic ICT planning is not only about the adoption of digital tools and processes—it should also consider remote workforces, how teams work together, and their readiness to adopt technology. It is thus important to review how any cloud investments you make will support collaboration, as well as change how your employees work. In some instances, training and change management are necessary to get the most value from new cloud systems. It is also essential to ensure that your people understand best practices in cloud security to keep your systems and data protected.
- Focus on continuous improvement and optimisation
Moving towards the cloud is an ongoing process rather than a journey with a definite end. It’s important to regularly monitor the performance and usage of your cloud resources to identify inefficiencies, optimise costs, and ensure optimal performance. It’s also important to keep an eye of the latest trends—such as artificial intelligence and the internet of things—to determine when your business could benefit from these innovations.
Think of the cloud as a new way of doing business
Many SMEs think of the cloud as a cheaper way to access technology, but there is more to it than that. We find that SMEs benefit from the cloud when they think about how it makes them more flexible and resilient. Don’t just think of it as a way to save money—ask how it can transform your customer experience, support innovation, and ultimately help your business to grow.