The talent squeeze puts pressure on migration ambitions
Published by Colt Technology Services on January 24, 2023
Skills shortage makes the choice of cloud partner critical
There is a severe global shortage of IT skills, and it is proving a common obstacle to many cloud migration projects. This is one of the signature conclusions of Colt’s annual cloud report for 2022, which looked into the cloud adoption objectives of senior decision-makers. This blog looks at the issue in detail.
Organisations are migrating to the cloud at different speeds and with various degrees of success according to industry sector, geography and size of the workforce. But if cloud stakeholders everywhere agree on one thing, a global shortage of appropriate skills is holding back most projects.
Colt’s annual cloud report for 2022, which looked into the cloud adoption attitudes and objectives of 500 senior IT and C-suite decision-makers, revealed that the shortfall in experienced cloud professionals is an issue. Two sectors in particular voted the problem as acute: digital infrastructure companies, with 85% of respondents mentioning it as a significant issue, and media and entertainment at 82%. Even the least affected sector, travel, transport and logistics, gave it a 65% problem rating. Financial services (78%), manufacturing (76%) and healthcare and pharmaceuticals (75%) are suffering badly too.
Despite having the most significant population in Europe, Germany was the country that rated the skills shortage as having the most detrimental effect on cloud success. France (78%) and the UK (76%) were close behind. Singapore (76%) and Japan (73%) prove that the issue is more than just a European one. Italy on 65% was the least concerned country.
Many organisations fear that many of their tech plans for the future, specifically cloud migration plans, are endangered by a shortage of experienced professionals. Where does this leave them? Fighting each other for a diminishing pool of human capital? Or looking for ways to reduce their need for an in-house IT headcount? The latter is the most practical solution. They are addressing the crisis head-on by finding a partner to take the stress of migration out-of-house.
The issue then becomes a matter of finding a partner with the right experience level. A good cloud partner will also be agnostic regarding the choice of public cloud platforms and will have the connectivity credentials required to make cloud services work for everyone across an organisation. Global reach is another crucial metric, as it is an infrastructure not tied to legacy standards. Finding a partner will allow an organisation to focus on getting business results from cloud migration.
If you would like to read more, you can download the full report or get in touch with Colt to see how we can help share our expertise with your teams.
Research is already underway for the next edition of the report, available later this year.
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