Ah yes, the challenges of cloud/digital transformation are in every CIOs DNA and the challenges fall to them to find solutions. Changing the mindset of the workforce to understand the need to embrace new technologies to keep ahead in their industry is the first hurdle.
When you look at the investment people make personally or professionally in the technology they use, they are reluctant to change. I am the biggest culprit for this – I prefer Samsung over the Apple iPhone, I favour Microsoft 365 over G-Suite, I prefer HP to Dell and this is just a few of my preferences.
Imagine this in an enterprise environment with those who are reluctant to change as they are dependent/comfortable using their preferred technology to perform in their roles. Adding to this, the IT Professionals are experts in supporting these technologies and have invested years of training to gain the relevant certifications to implement and support their users.
CIOs are already implementing different levels of Change Management to ensure the goal of customer satisfaction and safety, particularly in the financial sector. The amount of information available on Change Management for on premises and cloud is vast, so I am not going to repeat what has already been written by experts in this area – but the gist of it from a cloud perspective is, change is inevitable. People´s roles may change with the adoption of cloud technologies and could even result in not being needed anymore – so many are reluctant to even entertain the idea.
Once the CIOs have had many consultations with the various IT divisions and explained the objectives set out by the C-Suite and Board Members, they can support the teams by offering valuable training, communication to adapt and excel in the cloud transformation. Some will welcome the challenges, and these are the easy buy-ins, but mediation and support are vital to those who need a bit more encouragement.
You have to take your hat off to CIOs as this is no easy step, but once you have the teams embracing the inevitable, then they can move on to the myriad of challenges ahead. We will look into more of these in the next few posts.