Cloud Operating Model: Building and Understanding

Cloud Operating Model: Building and Understanding

Many firms are transitioning to a DevOps strategy, and changing their application teams into DevOps teams.

DevOps has transformed the way we produce and distribute software by integrating developers and operations into a single value stream. The advantages are demonstrated by helping organizations to:

• Thrive despite increased uncertainty and complexity in digital business models;
• Respond more quickly on different business occasions.

What is the cloud organization's mission?

The cloud organization's mission is to encourage the application team to build and operate their applications. All of that can be achieved by:

• Providing secure, compliant, standard and flexible cloud platforms;
• Providing services with minimum dependencies by leveraging self-service and Infrastructure as Code (IaC).

The cloud tribe provides application teams with central platforms and services that they can use to:

• Enable their application development processes;
• Become more productive.

The platforms and services catalogue may include the following:

• Different environments (Dev, Test, 34Prod),
• Continuous Delivery Pipelines,
• Monitoring and dashboards,
• Testing tools and services,
• Standards operating systems images,
• Containers,
• Etc..

By effectively delivering this platform and tooling to the application team as shared services, the application team can focus their efforts on building functionality for their customers. All of this will add value to the business as opposed to building the infrastructure that is needed to enable business functionality. This will shorten the time it takes to deploy functionality to the business.

How does the cloud operating model appear?

An operating model describes how a company operates and produces value for its customers. For example, the Cloud Operating Model can consist of the following aspects:

• Architecture,
• Automation,
• Organization,
• Security and compliance,
• Service management,
• Ways of working.

Before cloud technologies, teams developed operating models to define how technology would help the business. A variety of factors influence IT operating models. However, the following factors stay constant:

• Alignment to business strategy,
• Organization of people,
• Change management (or adoption processes),
• Operations management,
• Governance/compliance,
• Security.

When IT operations move to the cloud, some processes remain relevant. The wider process, however, may change in several aspects. Current operating models are based on physical assets in physical locations, which are supported by capital expenditure cycles. These assets sustain workloads required by the firm to keep operations running. The function of most operating models is to prioritize workloads by investing in physical asset stability.

What distinguishes a cloud operating model?

The hardware stack is an endless cycle. Also, physical hardware can easily break after which performance can suffer. Hardware failures rarely coincide with a company's capital investment budget and planning cycles. The way businesses do hardware refreshes and midnight patches changes when they're in the cloud. With the shift to cloud usage, they change their focus to the following points:

• Operating systems,
• Applications,
• Digital assets.

They still need the same individuals and processes with this transformation in their firm. But the main focus is now on a higher level of operations, and the success metric of their people will change after no longer having the need to focus on server uptime. A cloud operating model is a set of processes and procedures that specify how they intend to use technology in the cloud.

How to begin?

Some businesses are implementing these changes more aggressively than others, but complete change does not have to happen all at once. Although the work is well worth it, many businesses lack the resources to go beyond their current capabilities. Kicking off a major organizational transformation can be difficult. Starting small is the best approach to begin such a transition.

We recommend assembling a pilot team and organizing it around certain cloud products. Then, utilizing the new method of working, offer these products to the application teams. With this approach, organizations could cascade changes in their business. With the information they gather during the process, they could inspire the rest of the teams across the organization.

Conclusion

Each organization is different, and its operational model must be adjusted to match their ambition, needs, and maturity.

DevOps concepts and principles stay the same regardless of implementation. In the end, it's all about learning. As a result, everyone involved in the change should enjoy themselves. A suggestion is, to begin with, technology adoption. That will improve the operating model's efficiency. It will free up hardware resources for reallocation, as well as human resources so that they can focus on building the service delivery capabilities that are critical to the Cloud Operating Model.

If you want to know more about DevOps in general or you need help:

• visit our devops service page;
• give us a call at +385 1 3141 562;
• contact our sales department at sales@heptabit.com.

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