The top 5 modernization concerns for CIOs (and how to address them)

4. Staffing and Training

A common modernization dilemma that IT leaders encounter is how to get the right people for your business, and whether you should hire outside experts or teach your own team. It’s a complex question that depends on factors such as the size, scope and goals of the migration, your staff’s skills and capabilities, the project budget and timeline, and the availability and quality of outside experts. Training the staff can be beneficial for building internal expertise, enhancing employee engagement and reducing long-term dependency on external vendors. However, training can also be costly, time-consuming, and ineffective if the staff lack the necessary background, motivation or support to learn new skills and technologies.

Hiring outside experts can help access specialized knowledge, accelerate the migration process, and mitigate risks and challenges. However, hiring can potentially be expensive or disruptive.

• For most companies, the optimal approach probably combines both training and hiring, and finding the right balance requires a few important steps:
• Conduct a cloud readiness assessment to assess your current IT infrastructure, applications, data, security and governance maturity, and determine the migration scope and objectives.
• Perform a skills analysis to assess the current and future skills required — and to identify gaps where training or hiring is needed.
• Design a training plan that includes learning objectives, methods, resources and metrics, then select the right training providers and platforms.
• Develop a hiring plan that defines roles, responsibilities, qualifications and expectations for outside experts, and select the suitable vendors and partners.
• Implement an organizational change management plan that enables communication, collaboration and integration between internal and external staff, and monitors the progress and outcomes of the migration.

5. Data Integration and Interoperability

This is another topic that comes up frequently with cloud migration. It’s common for organizations, especially large health systems, to have hundreds of redundant applications. They’re all ready-made applications and they need special care. You can’t just go in, lift something, move it to another data center and *poof* you’re modernized. The same applies to interoperability and the data platform.

When we integrate data sets and ensure they can be accessed with the same quality and reliability from all our applications, we are essentially equalizing data availability. This means every part of the organization has equal access to the vital data shared across these applications. You want to think of the big picture. You want to have everything at the same level of reliability in its own bubble, so that if anything ever happens, you still can have the same uninterrupted access to your information, your same level of interoperability and that seamless access that you built from the start.

Modernization and cloud migration is a complex undertaking, regardless of your industry. We understand that the process can seem overwhelming and you may have many questions, but we’re here to assist you. With years of migration experience, we have the tools to make it possible. To see how we can help, see past success, or just start the conversation, read here.

For those of you in the healthcare industry, check out how the Power of Three can transform your organization.