Some of the processes that were effective on premises may not have translated well to cloud. During this step, you’ll want to pay close attention to processes that could be modified, refined and/or completely reworked to adapt to the changing business requirements. This may include workflows, IT processes, application development, audits, regulatory and/or compliance requirements.
Identify if/where the IT environment has been negatively impacted and/or under-performing since migration. Note any applications that were migrated as part of a lift and shift strategy during the migration phase. Are they performing as anticipated Flag these applications for further evaluation they may be candidates for rearchitecting.
Based on current growth trends for your organization, evaluate if you will effectively scale to meet demand. Consider the following: Scaling workloads in the cloud, minimizing disruption to business continuity, end-user experience, expanding to new regions, changing compliance mandates, etc. This data can provide insightful information to understanding where any vulnerabilities may be present. Identify if there are visibility gaps related to compliance and audit requirements.
Take note of any changes to the budget such as ownership (e.g., shift from IT to Security, CIO to CISO, etc) as this may influence and/or provide new sources of budget. Additionally, identify opportunities for cost savings, including observed redundancies in functions, manual processes that could shift to automation, consolidation of teams, etc.