PAUL COLMER
  • Blog
  • Vision
  • Influencer
  • Certifications
  • Shop
  • Blog
  • Vision
  • Influencer
  • Certifications
  • Shop
Search by typing & pressing enter

YOUR CART

19/9/2018 1 Comment

Cloud Adoption Roadmap in 10 Steps

Picture
Many CIO, CTO and business leaders are all working through their cloud strategies.  Most large companies in Australia have adopted a hybrid cloud approach, using both private and public cloud services.  In this blog, I'm wanted to outline  10 critical steps on how you can create a cloud adoption roadmap and then align this roadmap to your current execution path.
Picture
​
A cloud adoption roadmap is a really important tool, as it serves to visualise and communicate your plans to all key stakeholders in your organisation.  The important part of the roadmap is to ensure you have a clear 1 page visual outlining the key milestones / decisions points, backed up by clear definitions behind the roadmap of what each component on the roadmap means.  My suggestion is to use a modelling tool to create your roadmap and my top pick is the Abacus tool from Avolution.

Before we delve any deeper into our cloud adoption roadmap, let's be clear on some basic terminology, to ensure we're all on the same page:


Software as a Service (SaaS)
These are services that end-users consume.  Examples include: Social Media Tools, Salesforce, Office 365 and Xero.  The apps that you download to your mobile phone are predominantly SaaS.

Platform as a Service (PaaS)
These are services that developers consume to create SaaS products.  Examples include: Development Tools, Testing Tools and Datastores.  Apps that you download to your PC or laptop at home to allow you to write code, test code and setup datastores in the cloud are all examples of PaaS.
​
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
These are services that operations teams will build, test and commission to support developers, who consume PaaS and end-users, who consume SaaS on the PaaS, or SaaS via a 3rd party.  IaaS can be virtual machines, networking or basic storage.
If you're interested in digging deeper in cloud definitions, there is a simple whitepaper that the National Institute for Standards and Technology have produced.  It covers everything in 3 pages:
nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/legacy/sp/nistspecialpublication800-145.pdf

I've also created a simple reference model below:
Picture
DevOps
This is cultural change centred around ensuring that the developers (working on PaaS) are collaborating and communicating effectively with the operations teams (working on IaaS).  This is important to create secure, reliable and engaging SaaS apps.

Great video on DevOps from the DevOps Institute:
devopsinstitute.com/certifications/devops-foundation/

Hybrid Cloud
All organisations I have worked with in Australia, that have more than 100 employees will have a combination of private and public clouds in their environment.  This is the definition of hybrid cloud.  Probably 99% will have an on-premise (or 3rd party hosted) private cloud for Active Directory and using public cloud for Office 365  with Azure Active Directory.  The 1% is a single instance of G Suite I have come across. 

Great video on hybrid cloud here:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_n5Le8aePB4

Picture
Now that we have defined these terms, we can take a look at our Cloud Adoption Roadmap and our 10 steps:
  1. Perform a current state architecture analysis to understand how each department / business area is already adopting SaaS apps in your organisation.
  2. Understand the needs each department / business currently has and develop a feature-centric SaaS cloud adoption roadmap to cover the next 12 months.
  3. Communicate and seek feedback with the key stakeholders regularly, to guide your cloud adoption roadmap, particularly as the business investigates and pilots new SaaS apps and develops new business capabilities.
  4. Define a clear strategy at the CTO / CIO level as to whether you are going to adopt PaaS and/or IaaS services, or simply remain with SaaS-only services.
  5. Ensure your IaaS / PaaS strategy includes key business drivers and evidence of business need.
  6. Feed in your IaaS and PaaS strategy into the cloud adoption roadmap and socialise with key stakeholders.
  7. Based on business situational awareness and factors that are important to the key stakeholders, embark on a short IaaS / PaaS cloud service provider shortlist selection.
  8. Once the IaaS / PaaS shortlist is down to say 2-3 candidates run a proof of concept for each cloud service provider to determine the value, test your hypothesis on how you may transform your legacy IT and seek input from key stakeholders.
  9. Extend the IaaS / PaaS proof of concept to a pilot with a single cloud service provider, to further strengthen the more complex hyposthesis you've made with your current legacy IT investments.
  10. Extend your cloud adoption roadmap to include how you will transition your current private cloud and/or legacy IT investments to IaaS, PaaS and SaaS services, being cognisant that this may be a 2-5 year journey.
I recommend using the Lean UX method for testing out your hypothesis when validating your cloud adoption plan.  This can be found in the Scaled Agile Framework:
www.scaledagileframework.com/lean-ux/
Picture
If you're interested in learning more, I offer a range of Cloud, DevOps and Scaled Agile courses at ALC Training:

Cloud Courses (Foundation to Advanced)
www.alctraining.com.au/courses/cloud-computing/

DevOps (Foundation to Advanced)
www.alctraining.com.au/courses/devops/

Scaled Agile
www.alctraining.com.my/safe-scaled-agile-spc/
www.alctraining.com.au/course/leading-safe/
Picture
1 Comment

9/7/2018 0 Comments

What is the Scaled Agile Framework?

Scaled Agile Framework, or SAFe for short, is a large interactive knowledge-based of best practices, case studies, courses and toolkits.  The patterns and resources are proven, backed up by numberous case studies.  It is specifically designed to work for very small businesses, right through to multi-billion dollar corporate giants.  How does it do that? 
Picture
Well there are a number of components that allow the method to scale.  This includes a list of the key principles, outlined above, but also used the concept of Agile Release Trains.  These are teams of teams, containing all your resources, including suppliers and partners, that are co-ordinated through program increment (PI) planning.  These planning sessions ensure all the trains are moving in the same direction and that all the work is decomposed into features and stories.  This results in working code shortly after the first sprint.

The framework itself comes in four flavours:
  1. Essential SAFe
  2. Portfolio SAFe
  3. Large Solution SAFe
  4. Full Safe
The order and selection of the above configurations is highly dependent on the organisation's vision, committment and maturity to adopting Agile.  Below are all the frameworks for comparison.
Essential SAFe
Picture

 

Portfolio SAFe
Picture

 

Large Solution SAFe
Picture

 

Full SAFe
Picture
Still not convinced.....well there are a wealth of case studies on the SAFe site:

www.scaledagileframework.com/case-studies/

Below is are a few of my favourites:
Want to know more about how to use SAFe?  Please check out my Leading SAFe 2 Day Course.  Please let myself or ALC Training know when and where we can run this course for your organisation:
Picture
0 Comments

25/6/2018 0 Comments

Top 6 Cloud Service Providers in February 2018

For the first time in 2018, it's become easier than ever to gauge the state of the cloud market.  New data from the top cloud providers, mean we can really see who is dominating the landscape.  In this blog, I've chosen to look at the total revenue as an indicator of success.  Partly because it's easy to measure, but also because it given an indication of relative market opportunity and growth.

This chart is taken from a great ZDNET article that was published earlier this year:
www.zdnet.com/article/cloud-providers-ranking-2018-how-aws-microsoft-google-cloud-platform-ibm-cloud-oracle-alibaba-stack/
Picture
It clearly shows Microsoft as the dominant force, which I predicted would be the case back in 2016.  My colleagues at DXC Technology will attest to that prediction.  I think it's also a reflection on a number of compelling events that have materialised over the past few years:
  • Microsoft have invested significant amounts of money into their cloud strategy and you can see it's paying off.   www.onmsft.com/news/microsoft-spending-more-10b-year-azure-data-centers
  • Microsoft's cloud portal was reskinned around 3 years ago, which put AWS on the back foot.  azuretalk.wordpress.com/2015/02/24/azure-portal-new-look-and-feel/
  • All medium and large corporate companies of note, already have a relationship with MIcrosoft through an Enterprise Agreement (EA).  This EA provides Microsoft with significant scope for commercial leverage, through price reductions, discounts and bundled services, across the Azure and Office 365 platforms.  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Enterprise_Agreement
  • Office 365 is a serious force to be reckoned with.  There is no real competition in this space and the vast majority, if not all companies, use some components of the product suite.  Integrated with Active Directory technologies for authentication, authorisation and access control.
Although Google offers their G-Suite, I don't really see it as a serious competitor or replacement for Office 365. In fact they complement each other.  I typically use Google for managing both business and personal data on my Google Pixel and then Office 365 for Surface Pro, MAC and iPad and then OneDrive across all of them.  Below is a quick snapshot of how Google and Office stack up:
Picture
On the Amazon Web Services side, there is much progress and improvement especially in the area of new services.  AWS are very good in the Serverless and PaaS spaces, adding a whole series of new innovations.  These and exciting innovations were announced at the AWS ReInvent 2017 conference last year and include:
  • AWS Fargate - Serverless Containers
  • Amazon ECS for Kubernetes - Container Management
  • Amazon Neptune - Graph Database
  • Amazon Sumerian - Create and run 3D apps for Virtual Reality & Augemented Reality Use Cases
  • AWS IoT Analytics - Analyse IoT data at scale
  • Amazon Rekognition Video - Video Analysis using Machine Learning
You definitely can not accuse Amazon of being static, boring, with all this innovation coming thick and fast.  Amazon are certainly pushing the curve, as there are no Microsoft Azure equivalents for some of these services.  Amazon Sumerian is a case in point.  See the screenshot below:
Picture
Oracle are coming up fast, probably as a result of their push in the past 12-18 months.  A rep at Oracle invited me to attend Oracle Cloud World, which introduced me to the maturity and sleek look of their latest cloud offerings.  The pics below gives a quick overview of the Oracle Cloud offerings:
Picture
Picture
Picture
IBM is a little way behind the Top 2 leaders with their suite of cloud offerings.  IBM Watson is probably the best known.  I'm still waiting for IBM to approach me to, and invite me to their conference.  Check out the screenshot below:
Picture
More information on IBM cloud services can be found here:  
www.ibm.com/services/cloud?lnk=hpmse_ts&lnk2=learn


Alibaba are a definitely one to watch.  My prediction, is that by 2020 Alibaba will be No. 3 by revenue and may well be looking to eat up AWS with a takeover strategy, to compete with Microsoft.  Here is a quick overview of the predicted growth of Alibaba revenue vs AWS:
Picture
And here is a good article that articulates how large and dangerous Alibaba really is.  I do apologise for all the popups, but the free content on the site IS worth the pain:
​www.cbinsights.com/research/amazon-alibaba-international-expansion/

The link below gives another perspective on the Microsoft / AWS revenue growth story, outlining some of the great customers stories to come out of the Azure platform.  These include:
  • Coca Cola
  • UPS
  • Toyota
​www.forbes.com/sites/bobevans1/2018/04/27/microsoft-tops-amazon-in-q1-cloud-revenue-6-0-billion-to-5-44-billion-ibm-third-at-4-2-billion/#57a5358a5d4b

Finally if you feel you need some specialised training or business advice on AWS, Microsoft Azure, IBM, Oracle or Cloud CyberSecurity, feel free to reach out to me or to ALC Training:
www.alctraining.com.au/courses/cloud-computing/
Picture
#CloudComputing #Cloud #AWS #Amazon #Microsoft #Azure #Office365 #CyberSecurity #CCSP #Training #Coaching #AI
0 Comments

17/5/2018 0 Comments

What Is General Data Protection Regulation or #GDPR ?

The European Union EU) adopted a new law in 2016.  It affects every company with customers residing in the EU.  It  comes into force on 25th May 2018, which is just over a week away.  It is called the General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR for short.  But what does it mean, and should companies be worried?
Picture
​Firstly it address a number of key areas around the privacy of data to EU citizens, in relation to the storage, processing and handling of personal data.  Personal data includes data that can identify the individual directly.  This can include the following:
  • Name
  • Address
  • Contact Information
  • Date of Birth
  • Health Records
  • Photographs
  • Resumes
  • Drivers Licence
Below is a very short and simple video introducting the GDPR legislation:
I've simplified and summarised the key points of the GDPR legislation below:​
  • The customer has to give consent to the processing and usage of personal data.  This can affect businesses who record calls as a matter of practice.
  • ​Each EU country will appoint an independent supervisor authority who will handle customer complaints relating to the storage and usage of their personal data.
  • Storing of personal data must be done in a way that does not automatically identify the data subject. This means techniques like encryption, tokenisation and masking need to be understood and how they can be applied to the data.
  • Companies have a maximum of 72 hours to declare that they have had a data breach.  
  • Customers have the right to request erasure of their data.  This means that businesses, including cloud providers, need to ensure they are using the appropriate security controls to remove that data.  This can include using crypto-shredding, overwriting and encryption techniques.
  • Customers are also able to transfer their personal data from one system to another.
  • Automated decision-making, using techniques such as rules based scoring and artificial intellgience, is also under scrutiny.  Customers have the right to question and fight such decisions.
Picture
The overall effect is to provide improved protection for EU citizens and to unify the laws across the EU.  This puts onus on those businesses, including the cloud providers to ensure that data is processed fairly and in accordance with the law.  There are a number of sanctions that can be enforced, depending on the nature of the breach:
  • Written warnings.
  • Periodic data protection audits.
  • Fines of up to $20mEUR or 4% of revenue in the event of an infringement on the most significant provisions.

So what should companies do?  Firstly they need to seek legal advice from an expert in European Union law to understand the potential impacts and next steps.  Next steps are to perform an audit of their business processes and how they store data to understand their current state.  Then they need to perform some analysis on the law, with their legal expert to interpret the law and create a series of overarching requirements.  These requirements then need to be solidified into a series of solutions.  

Here is a great example of how market-leading SaaS cloud provider Xero, are approacing their GDPR obligations in relation to their financial accounting package:
Picture
It's so important in all this work to ensure that the IT, security, legal and business departments are all working together closely to work through the issues and implement the solutions.

Want to know more about how you can secure your data and ensure you are following the latest best practices?  Consider taking a Certified Cloud Security Professional certification, leading to an ISC2 examination.  I'd be glad to coach you through your questions and help expand your knowledge of all things security:

www.alctraining.com.au/course/ccsp-certified-cloud-security-professional/
Picture
0 Comments
Forward>>

    Categories

    All Active Directory AI Architecture Big Data Blockchain Cloud Comedy Cyber DevOps Driverless Cars MicroServices Office 365 Scaled Agile Social Media

    Picture

    Author​​

    Paul Colmer is an AWS Senior Technical Trainer.  Paul has an infectious passion for inspring others to learn and to applying disruptive thinking in an engaging and positive way.

    Paul has experience in building digital architecture strategies.  This includes the development and execution of training material and workshops, architecting and leading digital transformation initiatives, providing expertise on social media marketing, as well as advanced presenting using comedy, drama and music.

    Certifications include: Amazon Web Services(3 x Associates + 1 ML Specialty), Scaled Agile Framework (SPC), Cloud Security (CCSP), DevOps Culture (DevOps Foundation & DevSecOps Engineering), Big Data (EBDP), Data Science (EBDA), Microsoft Azure (AZ-900), Office 365 and a few others...... 

    He is currently one of the Rise.Global Top 50 Global Cloud influencers on social media.

    ​www.rise.global/the-cloud-social-influencers-power-100/p/1804096/r/2556192

    And one of the OnalyticsTop 100 Big Data influencers on social media:

    onalytica.com/blog/posts/big-data-top-influencers-and-brands/

    He is also a keen writer and an award-winning open-mic comedian.

    Contact Paul Colmer via LinkedIn.
    ​
    Or simply watch his videos on YouTube.

    Archives

    May 2023
    January 2023
    November 2022
    December 2021
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly