For Business and IT professionals

Is your team confused about cloud adoption?

In many companies cloud decisions are stalled by lengthy discussions. People and even entire teams are disagreeing on the proper cause of action. One group wants to move recklessly fast, while another group is overly concerned by risks and how to handle them. This disagreement causes them to lose time, money, and opportunities. Learn to apply a three step framework to accelerate your cloud decisions, and establish yourself as a powerful connector between business and technology.Your team is confused, and it's your job to teach them a way out of there.

Navigating cloud adoption decisions can be tricky

Too often, organisations make the leap to the cloud for the wrong reasons—or hesitate for equally misguided ones. In this hands-on workshop, you'll explore real-world scenarios to learn how to create compelling financial business cases for a successful cloud adoption, while also taken non-tangible outcomes into account. Whether the answer is "yes" or "no," you'll be equipped to better convince stakeholders with clear, data-driven insights.A business case communicates to all stakeholders why a certain cloud project should (or should not) be executed.Without a good business case, proponents and opponents of a cloud project will debate endlessly.But once that case is agreed upon, the project can swiftly start, and be properly controlled.My name is Peter van Eijk, and I help business and IT professionals achieve success in cloud adoption initiatives and secure stakeholder buy-in by teaching them how to craft detailed cloud business cases that quantify benefits, address common risks, and analyse costs and ROI.Join me on Thursday afternoon October 31, 2024 soon for a live, online workshop that includes pre-reading, a 3-4 hour interactive session, and personalised follow-up to ensure your success. As this is a pilot, there is a limited amount of seats. Let me know what interests you, and I will keep you updated.

Do you want to find out how the workshop will accelerate your team's secure cloud adoption? Book a free call with me.

Interactive workshop

What will be covered:

  • The three step framework: Define, Align, Refine.

  • Define the transformation: how is the cloud project going to make an impact? Learn how to identify the true value of cloud adoption. Hint: it is often not about IT cost savings.

  • Align: who are the stakeholders, and why do they matter to the project? Learn about typical stakeholders.

  • Refine: Sharpen your business case by avoiding common pitfalls, exploring costs and benefits, and ensuring a strategic approach to cloud adoption.

  • Strategic Storytelling: Develop the skills to present your business case in a way that resonates with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

  • Real-World Pitfalls: Explore where cloud business cases failed—and how they could have been avoided.

  • From the board level to individual projects, which ones to prioritise?

  • What to consider when changing course in a running project.

  • Cloud to cloud migration, or even repatriation to your own kit.

  • Business cases for DevSecOps engineers.

  • You will learn to explain why lift-and-shift of an application to the cloud almost never has a good return on investment.

  • Learn how the business case your cloud provider gives you is often way more positive than is warranted.

  • Five types of cloud business cases, why they are different, and why it is a mistake to select the wrong type. E.g. lift and shift, on-prem versus cloud, variable load, open source versus SaaS. Should we consider cloud repatriation? Hint: it is often more about the business value than it is about the IT cost.

  • Your business case. Bring your own business case!

  • A structured approach to uncovering costs, benefits, and risks, even if they are not quantifiable.

  • You will come away with a capability to create and analyse a cost/benefit business case for a cloud adoption project.

  • A cloud business case is even more important after the project is started: it helps when making tough decisions.

Frequently Asked Questions

  • Who is this workshop for? This workshop is designed for cloud professionals, IT decision-makers, business analysts, and anyone involved in evaluating or proposing cloud solutions.

  • "But we have already decided to go to the cloud." I hear this a lot. And while I hope that the business case was based on a good strategic analysis, and not just a good lunch, it does not stop there. After this decision, there are hundreds of potential projects to move things to the cloud. Can you do all of them at the same time? If not, did the board give any guidance on how to prioritise these? Even if they did, whose job is it to review this on a project by project basis? Wouldn’t it be great if you could apply some easy method to this? That is where you need a business case too.

  • What kind of prior experience with cloud technologies do I need? Basic familiarity with cloud concepts is recommended, but the workshop is structured to be accessible to those new to cloud business cases as well.

  • What will I need to participate in the workshop? You will need a computer with internet access, a spreadsheet application (like Excel or Google Sheets), and the ability to participate in online discussions.

  • How much time will I need to commit outside of the live workshop? Plan for a few hours of pre-reading and homework before the live session, and additional time afterward for the one-on-one review session.

  • What materials and resources will I receive? Participants will receive a comprehensive set of materials, including templates and examples. But most of all, they will come away with new skills.

  • What is the format of the hands-on exercises? The exercises are practical and scenario-based, designed to simulate real-world challenges in cloud adoption and business case development. In fact I want you to bring your own scenario to the workshop.

  • How will this workshop help me in my role? You’ll gain practical skills in developing and presenting data-driven cloud business cases, which will help you and your company to make informed decisions and effectively communicate with stakeholders. Moreover, should the project be started, the business case will be an important tool to manage the project and measure its success.

  • How will this workshop benefit my company? The time to decide on a cloud project will decrease, whether the decision is positive or negative. This will save time, effort, frustration and anger, and will lead to benefits being realised earlier. That is the business case for a business case...

  • What language will the workshop be in? It depends on the audience. Probably English, but I can also review submissions and questions in Dutch, German and French.

  • Great, but I still have questions about how this is going to help me. Sure, talk to me, I am a real human. Book a call here.

About your workshop facilitator

Peter van Eijk is probably one of the most experienced cloud instructors world-wide. In addition he has helped create many large business cases as an IT-strategy consultant for a big 4 firm.
Do you have questions about the workshop or how to register? Book a call here.

What others say

"I love the years of experience and how he helps the student connect the dots." - Terry Burrus
"Engagement great, very informative and wide knowledge" - Mark Grudgings

For businesses, there are some subtleties in the order process, in particular with reverse VAT and getting invoiced. Arrange for a quick call if assistance is needed.

Program and lesson plan

About a week before the workshop, you will get a mail with an introduction to the program, and about 1 hour of homework, which consists of reading a fictional case description and an invitation to formulate your own case.

The workshop itself will be Thursday Oct 31, 2024; 13:00-17:00 Amsterdam/Paris time; online.The online session will have hourly breaks, and consists of the following elements:
1 Introduction, getting to know each other
2 Examples of cloud use cases, including the fictional example
   E.g. lift and shift, on-premisses versus cloud, variable load, open source versus SaaS
3 Formulation of participant's use case
4 What is a business case?
   * convince stakeholders of a certain cloud project (intervention) based on financial as well as nontangible benefits.
   * what is the intervention
   * who are the stakeholders and why do they matter
   * what matters to stakeholders (it is not just the money)
5 Participants describe and review their case: stakeholders and intervention
6 Costs and benefits
   * cost model
   * types of costs (capex/opex, admissible, sunk, non tangible, risk) and cost drivers
   * spreadsheets and scenarios
7 Participants map their case to a set of templates/archetypes
8 Data gathering and its pitfalls
9 Participant exercise in guestimating their data
10 Presenting the business case to the stakeholders
11 Participant exercise
12 Review and feedback

After the workshop every participant will have a 1-1 call to discuss the implementation of the new skills in the participant organization (or their clients).

The small print

This page is part of https://www.clubcloudcomputing.com

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