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When the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable

Milton Friedman once said "Only a crisis, actual or perceived, produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function; to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable.”

The idea of cloud computing has been bubbling away for a few years now. Many CIOs have watched but not acted, for a number of reasons. One reason may be personnel. If your team is entrenched in the behaviours and solutions of an on-premise world the change management exercise for the IT team, let alone the organisation would take cloud computing off the agenda. To tell your CEO that he will be using his favourite PC application on the browser, ditto. The decoupling of systems intertwined in the on-premise world, don't go there. There are many reasons why cloud computing may be politically impossible.

The question is not a choice between on-premise or in the cloud. That was answered when Microsoft announced its "software plus services" strategy. Rather, the question is, "how long until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable?"

Cloud Computing Threat to IT

Cloud Computing is not a panacea. It simply removes certain aspects of technology which are commoditized and focuses IT efforts further up the value chain. This will require re-education and reskilling but nonetheless presents an opportunity for those that are willing to evolve. One could argue technology no longer provides competitive advantage in the  one-size fits all, multi-tenant approach of Cloud Computing. You can implement Google Apps or Salesforce which is the same out of the box for everyone, but the  differentiation provided by IT will be through integration, analysis and extension of the cloud platform to provide value within your business. This requires IT skills, different types of IT skills but IT skills nonetheless. I can see how traditional IT service providers and VARs may start to feel nervous. They must also evolve their offering to take advantage of the opportunities presented by the new paradigm. Appirio is a great example of a next generation IT integrator who has done just that.

“Without change there is no innovation, creativity, or incentive for improvement. Those who initiate change will have a better opportunity to manage the change that is inevitable.” -  William Pollard