Cloud Strategy and Cloud Governance – What You Need to Know

Forrester defines cloud governance as a concept that includes the people, the processes, and the technology associated with your cloud infrastructure, as well as with your security and operations. This governance is then reinforced with a framework of policies and best practices aimed at making sure that all team members are adhering to the same high standards when using the cloud structure.

Cloud Governance & Regulatory Compliance
In terms of regulatory compliance, this approach to cloud governance is absolutely crucial. When compliance is implemented from the top-down — i.e. upper management understand their legal obligation and take responsibility for the team members beneath them in the organisational structure — things can quickly fall apart. Employees understand that there is a need for data security, and so they keep their log-in details safe and secure. However, they may still use their own, unsecured devices to access sensitive information. This risk can be eliminated by embracing governance across the board and putting policies in place that enable your team members to take ownership of the issues they face.

Cloud Governance & Business Effectiveness
Of course, this is not just about being regulatory compliant — a minimum standard as far as business is concerned — but also about optimising your company’s position in the market. When you adopt a new best practice for cloud usage, with the aim of pushing your business to the next level, you run the risk of failure unless you implement such practices at every level.
Getting governance right, and supporting this with company policies, is key to success here. So, as we’ve seen, effective governance requires a concerted effort. It requires each and every member of your team to be serious about the stake they hold in the business, and to do their utmost to uphold policy at every level.

Supporting Effective Governance with Technology
To support this, you need to deploy monitoring and some degree of automation within your cloud strategy.

-Monitoring
It is only through monitoring that you will be able to gain the insight you need into your organisation and the way in which it is utilizing the cloud structure. This monitoring needs to be deployed on a constant basis, keeping an ever-watchful eye on usage. This is difficult, or even impossible, to achieve manually.  Instead, there needs to be a platform in place that can conduct monitoring around the clock, and store the data gathered in a way that is immediately insightful. In implementing this kind of technology, you are giving your business a chance to achieve full compliance through effective governance, as well as gaining a unique understanding of strengths, weaknesses, and areas for improvement.

-Automation
To ensure full regulatory compliance, and more, from your cloud strategy, a degree of automation is required. Processes can be automated to different degrees: for example, you may want to deploy reminder messages that guide team members towards appropriate behaviours. This is not full automation, but it is an automatic feature that will have a significant impact on governance.
Automation can go much further than this. Automatic back-ups of key data to the cloud structure take the decision out of the team member’s hands and eliminate the danger of catastrophe further down the line.

The Nexon Agile Business Cloud provides organisations with the cloud structures they need to get ahead.

Get in touch with our team to find out how we can assist you with cloud strategies and governance designed to optimise your position in your field.