Self-service is now firmly on the cloud services that you use in everyday life. But within companies it often looks a bit different, says silicon.de blogger Michael Pauly. And again, the familiar motto: “No Cloud is an Iland” plays a certain role, because in the company, the individual services must be interconnected with each other.
Do-it-yourself, formerly better known as home improvement, is particularly popular with supporters of the cloud. And not only that. Self-service is so highly regarded that it has even found its way into the now universally accepted NIST definition. But is self-service always self-service ? Does the IT department in the company behave like “normal cloud users” at home?
No. And that also has to be different. Because, if I indulge in one or the other service from the cloud at home, then I order it myself and adjust the resource, capacities, etc., if necessary. So I really do EVERYTHING myself.
The company looks a little different. Well, (usually) not yet. But later with an intensive cloud use in any case. Because here I will break up the work: on the one hand the order of the service, on the other hand the adaptation to the respective need. Which does not mean that I need a split personality here ;-).
And why the whole? Thus the processes and thus the business runs “round”! If I opt for a new cloud service, then I must not just have exactly this one process in mind. No, I also have to make sure that everything else continues to work smoothly, that the other services and systems get the data they need. In short, cloud computing can not be an island in the enterprise .
Division of labor in the cloud age
If my business then runs with the help of the cloud, more or less often adjustments have to be made in order to react flexibly and dynamically. The decision on this is then, if this is not done automatically, with the responsible for the business. Often these are not the ones who ordered the cloud services.
My conclusion: Cloud computing in the enterprise requires a coordinated role and authorization concept, which is ideally determined on the way to the cloud. Or simply formulated: it must be determined who decides on new services. Who adapts these during operation? This can be one and the same, but it is usually not in our work-sharing world.
Oh yes, not only the cloud user in the enterprise has to adjust to this kind of division of labor. The cloud services should also support this eg with graduated user rights. But that’s a topic for one of my upcoming blog posts.