How to better choose Cloud Office Tools

Cloud computing, which is increasingly being paid attention to and used by many companies, is now deploying cloud software, but few companies are really ready to move their familiar local tools completely to cloud computing.

The New York Museum of Modern Art, Juan Montes, said that last year June, The Museum of Modern Art in cloud migration, when the museum replaced the local e-mail system for Google cloud-based Gmail and calendar. He said that as employees became more familiar with the concept of cloud computing, he saw that employees were no longer using only the two cloud-based apps, and were beginning to slowly use other cloud-based productivity applications.

"Google's collaboration tools are starting to be widely deployed and they are a mix of many things," Montes said. I see employees sharing and collaborating with Microsoft's Office documents on Google, both inside and outside the company. ”

Montes says cloud based software has a strong foundation in his company. But he is still not ready for a complete relocation of personal productivity applications to the cloud. And why?

Although some cloud-based applications are popular among some employees, he does not believe that personal cloud productivity tools are ready for cloud migrations, he said. He still has questions about compatibility and security, especially when sharing files with employees in other companies. He wondered if the cloud solution really had the same features and features as the locally installed Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel.

Migrating gradually to the cloud

Hendrick Auto Group recently replaced its local e-mail system with Microsoft's cloud-based Office suite Office 365.

The group's IT head, Robert Taylor, said he had no final data to determine whether the cloud was cheaper than local software in terms of fixed costs. However, he believes there is a certain difference in cost.

He says the move will have a major advantage in how 20 of it employees spend their working hours. "Because even if business grows we don't need to hire extra IT staff." We are able to redistribute these human resources to develop other applications to support the company's core business. ”

Taylor says the company's 7,000 employees have no questions about replacing the new cloud-based e-mail system. As early as seven years ago, the company had moved their sales terminals to the cloud, so many employees were already familiar with the cloud concept. Taylor says the reason he deployed Office 365 is because employees already know how to use Microsoft apps.

Taylor says he likes to move more of the Hendrick Car group's office apps to the cloud, but has not done so because the company's application to the industry is still problematic.

But he does not believe that these problems will last forever. He said he thought that as manufacturers began to focus on how to make these applications work together seamlessly, these applications would migrate to the cloud in the future.

Most businesses are considering migrating to cloud computing

Taylor and Montes are among the many IT executives weighing the advantages and disadvantages of cloud computing. In particular, in terms of personal productivity tools, personal productivity tools are traditionally synonymous with the local Microsoft Office suite. For most employees, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint are the most skilled tools to use. The popularity of the product was surprising. In 2009, a market research firm Forrester survey found that 89% of corporate customers used a version of Microsoft Office in employee productivity and collaboration.

As cloud computing is increasingly being used by individuals and professionals, more and more it executives are asking themselves whether cloud-based productivity and collaboration tools are the way forward, analysts say.

In a 2011 Forrester observation, Forrester surveyed 150 it decision makers. The survey found that all 150 it decision-makers supported the use of a version of Microsoft Office. 72% of those surveyed began to consider cloud-based applications. More specifically, 3% of respondents are starting to deploy or have deployed alternative tools for web-based Office Tools, such as Google's docs or Zoho. 15% of respondents are trying or testing. 10% per cent of respondents were actively concerned, and 44% per cent said they were interested.

"A lot of people are asking this kind of question, but I think it will take years to solve it," said Stanton Jones, analyst at the Information Services Group (ISG) at Stanford Connecticut State, the US. ”

Randi Levin, general Manager and chief technical officer, said Los Angeles also changed its local e-mail system to Gmail two years ago, a move that could save about $1 million a year on software, hardware and support costs.

At present, in addition to the police, Los Angeles all departments have 17,000 users are using Gmail.

According to Levin, the reason for Los Angeles to choose Gmail is to save costs, because if it runs on the cloud, then there is no need to pay for it. She says IT departments and users have fully recognized the benefits of cloud migration.

Levin says many employees already love the fact that they can access e-mail through their devices, whether they are smartphones, tablets or traditional desktops. IT staff found that the disaster recovery system has become part of the entire solution, not an isolated part, as it used to be. IT staff can extract their resources and energy from the support and upgrade e-mail systems, because Gmail is almost no longer required to provide support.

Consider bandwidth and ease of use factors

Montes says the reason the Museum of Modern Art is turning to the cloud is that it delivers more affordable and maintainable applications while providing greater scalability, storage, and redundancy. Employees are more likely to have access to the application in mobile.

These advantages, coupled with increasing staff familiarity with cloud-based tools, allow Montes to consider more formal support for more productivity applications migrating to the cloud. He says he's focused on Office 365 and Google Apps. He has evaluated the museum's network to ensure that enough bandwidth is available to support these cloud-based applications to prevent any delays.

He says he is thinking about how to get employees to better use these cloud-based applications, and whether these cloud-based applications can actually match the local version in functionality.

Many companies are facing the same dilemma, said Glenn Oclassen, vice president of cloud deployment at Appirio Company. Appirio is headquartered in San Mateo, California, which once helped cloud the New York Museum of Modern Art.

"It took us a long time to get used to Microsoft Office products," he said. Not only have we gotten used to it, but it has also become a measure of individual productivity. With Cloud solutions, you will forget many behaviors that represent the level of personal productivity. ”

For example, in order to upgrade, the IT department has to have employees stop sending and receiving e-mail, and employees don't need to learn how to synchronize work on the same document, because there will be more efficient and effective collaboration. After all, such efficient collaboration is one of the main advantages of the cloud, Oclassen said.

"The adjustment of these procedures will be a bigger challenge," he said. ”

Oclassen says companies must also train employees on how to use cloud tools and how to adjust work processes and workflows to stay in top condition.

The chief information officer must have seen that the enhanced collaboration capability has become the main selling point for moving personal productivity tools to the cloud, Jones said. They also see that the cloud is becoming more manageable, with a more rational cost-effectiveness. At the same time the upgrade no longer needs the company's IT staff to worry, but the manufacturer is responsible for processing. An increasing number of mobile devices have access to one of the advantages of the cloud.

Risks to consider

These cloud applications also have the potential to collapse and some limitations. "They're not for everyone," says TJ Keitt, a Forrester analyst. ”

For example, advanced users of Excel who create large numbers of macros and create large numbers of cells in complex equations will find that the functionality of those complex macros is reduced when switching to a cloud-based spreadsheet.

Other observers have come to the same conclusion that web-based PowerPoint and Excel alternatives are functionally not comparable to local applications.

The Enterasys Network company headquartered in Anduo, Massachusetts, has provided some lessons for us.

Company chief information Officer Dan Pelton said the company moved its customer relationship management (CRM) system to cloud-based Salesforce.com in 2003, so they were recognized as the first cloud-conscious company. The company is now replacing its local Microsoft Exchange e-mail system with Google's e-mail and calendar apps for its 1100 employees. Compared with Microsoft's, Google's products are 35% cheaper in price and offer more upgrades-including the training and coaching needed to get employees to use cloud-based new e-mail applications, he said.

Despite many positive experiences, Enterasys's Pelton says he does not believe that cloud-based employee productivity applications are functionally comparable to local Microsoft apps.

"We don't think they can completely replace Microsoft Office, especially when it comes to complex spreadsheets that are often used financially." We're also a company that relies heavily on PowerPoint, so it's also a hindrance to employee cloud migration. Documents, spreadsheets, and slides, employees say they can't give up. So we don't want to challenge this situation, so we also keep them. ”

For many employees, the level of user acceptance is also a problem, says Levin of Los Angeles. Although she admits it has nothing to do with the cloud, it's about adjusting from one manufacturer's product to another. Most cloud products will be upgraded and adjusted frequently, although these are automatic, but also make users feel dissatisfied.

Levin also said that while some users were concerned about cloud security and privacy issues, she found that large cloud providers could provide more security experts and security features than any single company.

Do not migrate completely to the cloud

Pelton that his company will one day be completely transferred to the cloud. Employees will be able to access cloud-based alternatives because Google's docs can meet most of the requirements and allow collaboration, which is only a matter of time.

Pelton says he believes that the cloud's advantages, combined with a rise in web-based productivity and collaboration tools, will be the determining factor in the migration of all personal productivity tools to the cloud.

With the full deployment of Gmail, more and more employees are starting to use other apps such as Google Docs in cloud Suites to look for the productivity advantages that cloud computing has long promised, Levin said. However, she did not migrate all Los Angeles government apps to the cloud because many employees refused to migrate to the cloud because most employees were unfamiliar with Google's products and some employees actually needed to use the features currently offered by Microsoft products.

"I don't think we will ever abandon Microsoft's local products. At this point, we will passively accept. ”

For small Businesses

Randy Parker is an agent for the Legalshield Legal Services security company in Ida, Oklahoma. On the recommendation of several peers, Randy Parker started using the Cloud-based CRM component provided by Zoho six months ago. He was impressed by the attempt and decided to use Zoho for e-mail, scheduling and word processing.

Parker lives in Pine Lake, California. He said he was impressed that he needed to pay 12 dollars a month for the services he had received. This allows him and his colleagues to access documents from any computer. Cloud applications, he says, look as fast as local applications.

However, he did not abandon the use of local Microsoft apps.

He says he is still using Microsoft Word, especially when he wants to elaborate or make some impressive leaflets for his clients. Parker said: "I already know how to use Word to do these things." I don't want to spend any more time learning how to use Zoho to do these things. "With the shift to cloud vendors, the company has to solve the training problems of its employees," he said.

He said he would also choose which application to use as needed, because Zoho once had a failure that prevented him from working.

He said: "Although the failure lasted no more than 24 hours, but the failure occurred in Friday, the same day I have no way to work." It's very annoying. I began to have a second thought. ' Do I really want someone else to take control of my data? ' He was also dissatisfied with the speed at which Zoho was troubleshooting and still charging for downtime.

He also admits he is concerned about the safety of the cloud. This is another issue of general concern to the enterprise. Analysts, like some other IT executives, believe that, even if not exceeded, cloud vendors provide the same security as local applications managed by IT departments.

Perhaps these concerns do not prevent Parker from using cloud computing. Parker said: "I feel good about cloud computing." The risk of failure is very small, especially when you are considering all the advantages. ”

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