Overview

Technologies once relegated to the pages of science fiction novels, like artificial intelligence, digital currency, and self-driving cars are now a reality that Federal agencies at every level must better understand and leverage to improve efficiencies, support mission critical operations, and enhance citizen services. As these and other technologies evolve, the Federal government must be prepared to modernize their IT infrastructure at great speed and scale. That's why moving to the cloud, often under mandate, is now a strategic imperative for Federal agencies. And why solutions like Cisco AppDynamics and ThousandEyes are critical to that move as they help you map the architecture and workload flows for accurate migration planning.

Top Challenges to Enterprise
Cloud migration*:

Minimizing downtime
Staying within budget
Performance impacts
Cybersecurity threats

Cloud-Based Apps**:

70%

of organizations have at least
one application in the cloud.

Strategic Trends***:

85%

of cloud strategies include
multiple clouds.

*CloudEndure Cloud Migration Strategy Survey **IDG Enterprise Cloud Computing Survey ***RightScale State of the Cloud Survey

Strategies for Federal agencies

There is no single path for the Federal government when moving to the cloud. The choices of public cloud, private cloud, hybrid cloud, Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), build or buy, and cybersecurity approach can inflict analysis paralysis on even the best public sector IT leaders. That's why you should consider a multi-cloud strategy, leveraging a variety of approaches to successfully move your IT environments to the cloud. Some of the most successful we've seen instituted by government organizations include:

Lift-and-shift

Re-architect and Refactor

Cloud Native

Reconsider

Provision, import, and deploy applications and infrastructure resources to match existing, onpremises architecture without modification.

Update application components and middleware to utilize cloud services and patterns such as unlimited blob storage, distributed message queues, auto scaling, and managed databases.

Completely rewrite applications to make intelligent and efficient use of cloud services in a way that can’t be accomplished with traditional paradigms.

For some applications, the cloud does not offer significant advantages; sometimes it makes the most sense to leave those running in the data center or even sunset them.

Challenges in migrating

Like any technology, the cloud is not foolproof. And depending on your agency's role,
you may face additional challenges along the way. So before your start, consider the following questions:

How will keep your network and users safe from cybersecurity threats throughout the transition?

Which applications should you migrate first?

How will you monitor and
minimize impacts on users before, during, and after?

How can you continuously demonstrate benefits of the move?

What training does your IT staff need to effectively build and operate cloud environments?

The journey you are about to embark on can be a risky one for your agency.
That's why we've developed the following ten tips to help you minimize the risk and maximize the success of your cloud migration.