It seems that cloud computing is all the rage. Who wouldn’t like the idea of being able to access a virtualization of many resources: applications, servers, data storage and services, and networks, all of which you have on-demand access to.
Cloud computing comes with many benefits that make it so attractive to many end-users, including: access to a wide range of applications without having to download or install them, applications can be accessed from any computer anywhere in the world, only using what hardware and software you need, sharing resources in one place, consumption billed as a utility with minimal upfront costs, and scalability via on-demand resources. With all of its positives, why wouldn’t cloud computing be attractive to project management?
For a project manager, the cloud represents several issues, particularly when it comes to having the knowledge of everything going on in a project and being able to control it. There’s is no title in the cloud, ownership of the project and its data strictly is not yours. There’s a degree of control lost. Several inherent pressures will then exist, making project life more difficult, particularly around service level agreements (SLAs). There are also answers needed to the issues surrounding cloud subscriptions, data integrity, and methodology challenges for PRINCE2 and ITIL.
With cloud computing, everything seems that much easier. As a result, your work is often expected to take on a new speed with application development requested to move more quickly. SLAs can fall by the wayside, making life more difficult for you and your team. SLA problems can become even more problematic in the event the cloud computing subscription is ramped up and more users are using the service. When more users are added, you literally need to look for ways to do a lock-down to prevent outside interference. The extra users have the potential for data integrity issues, additional costs, unmitigated risks, and breaches of minimum governance standards.
If you’re a project manager in the cloud, there are yet other factors that can threaten to lose control of SLAs. Because the cloud provides the ideal environment for development APIs, you have access to many interfaces available from vendors and third parties alike. Many are perfectly fine, but there are others whose quality is questionable and even malicious. It wouldn’t take a great deal for them to take control and damage projects.
With regard to PRINCE2: the cloud can undermine the large-scale and comprehensive project methodologies of PRINCE2, just because this is the nature of PRINCE2. Its key elements are universally applicable to all projects, but due to the nature of cloud projects – unstructured with a implement first and modify as you go along – simply aren’t consistent.
If you have fully adopted the ITIL framework, you shouldn’t be worried about your ITSM if you move to the cloud environment. You might have to do some tweaking in your processes, policies, and standards slightly, but the impact of the migration should be minimal. Less adoption of ITIL could result in needing to redefine or re-implement your entire set of ITIL processes.
There are still some remaining questions about project management and its face in cloud computing. Can you safely keep a project’s data in the cloud? Are you able to scale down at the end of projects? If you decide to leave the cloud, what happens to the data?
The universal access as provided by cloud computing remains a positive factor. Going so far as to using cloud-hosting project management applications can still be beneficial, as the applications can be used for the life of projects. Even more favorable is the fact that if you have geographically disparate teams, collaboration becomes even easier. Information sharing and project status updates can be circulated among teams, C-level executives, and business stakeholders.
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