Managing projects in the "Cloud"

The current issue of the Economist has a special report on Corporate IT and the central theme of the articles is the recent rise of cloud computing and its effects on the governance and management of IT initiatives in the corporate world:

Computing is taking on yet another new shape. It is becoming more centralised again as some of the activity moves into data centres. But more importantly, it is turning into what has come to be called a “cloud”, or collections of clouds. Computing power will become more and more disembodied and will be consumed where and when it is needed.

The rise of the cloud is more than just another platform shift that gets geeks excited. It will undoubtedly transform the information technology (IT) industry, but it will also profoundly change the way people work and companies operate. It will allow digital technology to penetrate every nook and cranny of the economy and of society, creating some tricky political problems along the way.

Because of the dot com bubble of the late 90s, I'm very skeptical to even cynical of such hyperbolie, but in this case I think a majority of the hype is justifed. The key term from the quote above is "disembodied", which is a pretty good way of describing the cloud. Terms such as decentralized, fragmented, and dispirate was and is still used to describe the networks which comprise the internet, but a more stronger term such as disembodied would need to be used to describe clould computing as it allows you to grab a software service from a totally abstracted layer that conceals a very complex infrastructure of data centers and virtualized storage technologies.

The image below from Wikipedia provides a pretty simplified pictorial of this architecture:


In addition, it list the key charactersitics of the Cloud:

• Capital expenditure minimized and thus low barrier to entry as infrastructure is owned by the provider and does not need to be purchased for one-time or infrequent intensive computing tasks. Services are typically being available to or specifically targeting retail consumers and small businesses.
• Device and location independence^[25] which enables users to access systems regardless of location or what device they are using (eg PC, mobile).
• Multitenancy enabling sharing of resources (and costs) among a large pool of users, allowing for:
  • Centralization of infrastructure in areas with lower costs (eg real estate, electricity)
  • Peak-load capacity increases (users need not engineer for highest possible load levels)
  • Utilization and efficiency improvements for systems that are often only 10-20% utilized.^[21]
• Performance is monitored and consistent but can be affected by insufficient bandwidth or high network load.
• Reliability by way of multiple redundant sites, which makes it suitable for business continuity and disaster recovery,^[26] however IT and business managers are able to do little when an outage hits them.^[27] Historical data on cloud outages is tracked in the Cloud Computing Incidents Database.^[28]
• Scalability which meets changing user demands (e.g. Flash Crowds) quickly, without having to engineer for peak loads. Massive scalability and large user bases are common but not an absolute requirement.
• Security which typically improves due to centralization of data, increased security-focused resources, etc. but which raises concerns about loss of control over certain sensitive data. Accesses are typically logged but accessing the audit logs themselves can be difficult or impossible.
• Sustainability through improved resource utilisation, more efficient systems and carbon neutrality.^[29]

So from a business point of view, you can view cloud computing as a broad array of web-based services aimed at allowing users to obtain a wide range of functional capabilities on a 'pay-as-you-go' basis that previously required tremendous hardware/software investments and professional skills to acquire. Cloud computing is the realization of the earlier ideals of utility computing without the technical complexities or complicated deployment worries. Therefore, in a nutshell, cloud computing seems to promise limitless computing power and storage space via the internet.

I have no doubt that some day this type of ubiquitous computing availability and services will come about. A tremendous amount has changed since that decade or so when the internet became a truly viable commercial technology. It has no doubt experienced bumps along the way, but there are utility services we enjoy today such as electricity, water and gas that we can acquire without having to think much about it and the downtimes are nearly non-existent, but I'm sure at the beginning had reliability and quality issues.

The Economist articles points out the potential problems to watch for such as reliability, security and ownership of data and information. These are very valid and obvious concerns to me, but one that concerns me the most as person who manages multiple projects that almost always have a IT component to them, is that before cloud computing resolves the common issues of reliability, security, etc. and becomes as ubiquitous and easy to use as utility services, there will be that ramp up curve wherein companies that adopt the cloud and tires to resolve all these issues makes a person like me who has to manage these projects get gravely effected by it.

Furthermore, even without cloud computing, there was a problem of too much software being built and/or purchased by companies looking to automate every process for cost savings or competitive advantage. This came at a very big cost in terms of infrastructure and application investments and caused huge project overruns that delivered applications that brought very little or no value to business. Cloud computing will help with the cost for infrastructure and application implementation, but in many ways the ease with which companies would be able to pick, purchase and use software services will cause more delays and little value, and though cost may be saved in the short run, time will be lost and in business, time is money.

Project managers will have no choice but to adopt a more agile approach, but for many companies such as the one I work for, there is still a need to comply with regulatory agencies such as HIPAA and SOX, which require a process and audit trail to be followed. Its hard enough now to balance these competing needs, I see the adoption of cloud computing with the potential to exacerbate this problem even further.

So while cloud computing promises much, there needs to be a healthy skepticism in one's evaluation of it's benefits.