If your organization hasn’t embraced the cloud yet, chances are you’re actively considering the move. For businesses focused on scaling and growth, cloud migration isn’t just an option — it’s a necessity. However, the journey can be more complex than it seems. Identifying obstacles and avoiding common pitfalls from the outset can make the difference between a seamless, successful transition and a costly, frustrating experience.
Addressing Cloud Migration Barriers Upfront
Cloud Migration Barrier #1: Lack of education and awareness
Cloud migration is a widely discussed topic, yet its true complexity is often overlooked. Many reduce it to a cost-cutting shift of infrastructure responsibilities, but in reality, it encompasses a multifaceted ecosystem of cloud computing models and migration strategies, each with unique challenges and nuances.
While most organizations and their leadership grasp the fundamentals of cloud migration, true success demands a more profound and strategic understanding of its intricacies.
Whether you adopt Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), opt to shut down applications and put apps in the cloud through Software as a Service (SaaS), or move to managed security services, they all require different levels of understanding and demand a varied approach to aligning stakeholders.
The more you understand cloud migration, the better equipped you’ll be to address why you want to migrate and to infer how you’re best going to do it.
Cloud Migration Barrier #2: Lack of understanding in critical areas
Cost and migration options are two areas where initial lack of understanding can create initial barriers.
- Cost: Shifting from on-prem operational expenses to cloud, consumption- and utilization-based pricing requires an organizational shift in how costs are estimated, measured, and charged. While it can result in long-term cost savings, educating stakeholders initially can be challenging.
- Cloud migration options: Understanding the options can be challenging for two reasons:
- While in the midst of migrating to the cloud, organizations typically must adopt new technology that comes with a learning curve.
- These are technical concepts that have to be communicated at a non-tech level to key stakeholders.
Cloud Migration Barrier #3: Perceiving cloud migration as just another cost
Cloud migration often comes with significant upfront costs, which can make it challenging to secure buy-in from key decision-makers. However, resistance to these expenses is often rooted in a lack of understanding of the transformative impact and long-term value of cloud adoption.
To borrow a timeless principle: “You have to spend money to save money.” Leaders must reframe these initial costs as a strategic investment — one that paves the way for substantial savings, greater efficiency, and long-term growth.
The most impactful way to convey this is by focusing on the specific benefits for various areas of the business, clearly illustrating where and how improvements will occur.
For instance, transitioning infrastructure to the cloud eliminates the need for physical datacenter rentals or leases, slashing operational costs and drastically cutting the hefty energy expenses tied to on-premises facilities.
There are two primary resources to leverage to overcome cloud migration challenges:
- Industry analysts and reports can provide guidance on data points needed to communicate these improvements. These analyst firms are uniquely positioned to capture a broad market perspective that is representative of what most customers are doing from a cloud transformation standpoint.
- Best practice documentation from cloud providers (Azure, AWS, GDP) are particularly helpful because their extensive experience with thousands of customers has allowed them to develop proven best practices, taking an approach that is based on what you want to do (use-case perspective) and why you want to do it (focus on desired end-state).
These resources break down cloud migration factors, guiding you through the process step by step and helping you ask the right questions along the way.
Once you’ve overcome the main barriers, it’s important to avoid the most common mistakes when selecting a migration strategy.
Anticipating & Mitigating Common Mistakes
Mistake #1: Assuming a lift-and-shift approach is best
A common misconception is that rehosting (aka lift and shift) is simply copying and pasting infrastructure from one place to another, such as to a shared location or cloud infrastructure. Equally, it’s assumed that following this approach will make cloud migration easy — but this is simply not true.
The complexity of cloud migration stems from the actual process of moving systems, often referred to as “lift and shift.” In an on-premises environment, you benefit from direct network connectivity, whereas in the cloud, the infrastructure relies on wireless connections. This shift introduces dependencies on networks like WANs, which serve as the gateway to your systems. Previously, when everything was local, identifying the root cause of issues was more straightforward. In a cloud environment, troubleshooting becomes more complex. During migration, additional factors come into play, increasing the potential for errors — something often overlooked.
Mistake #2: Focusing on existing problems instead of improvements
Organizations should view cloud migration as a strategic chance to resolve existing problems, uncover hidden gaps, and tackle critical challenges head-on.
For instance, imagine migrating an internet-exposed server with known vulnerabilities currently protected by a firewall. Simply adopting a lift-and-shift approach would transfer the server to the cloud without addressing the vulnerabilities, leaving them exposed and putting your systems at greater risk.
Instead, take advantage of the unique opportunity you’re given with your cloud migration strategy to:
- Reflect on the current state-of-play
- Improve and/or add efficiencies
- Put your infrastructure in a state that is far better than where it was on-prem
Mistake #3: Missing an opportunity to consolidate
Traditionally, on-prem hosting required large servers that occupied significant physical space. This meant carefully planning the placement of components, which often restricted how operations were managed. In contrast, moving to the cloud allows for scalable computing power without the same physical limitations, although cost remains a consideration
Transitioning to the cloud offers a great opportunity to streamline your infrastructure. For instance, if you’re currently managing a large number of file storage servers or multiple applications requiring load balancing, you may find that not all of them are necessary in the cloud. By optimizing your applications and improving redundancy, you can achieve greater efficiency without maintaining as much hardware.
Use your migration strategy as an opportunity to identify where you can consolidate and minimize what you have. This ultimately will support the idea that moving to the cloud is cheaper in the long run. In the cloud, less is more.
Additional Resources:
Checklist: Secure Cloud Migration
