Shaw Trust's CDIO on three-body Azure migration: "We're going to take three teams to the Microsoft cloud"

Evert Lombaert talks with Shaw Trust's CDIO, Alan Crawford, about the ongoing process and strategy of a Microsoft cloud migration after the recent three-body merger

Shaw Trust is a UK charity that aims to help vulnerable people into employment and independent living, as well as working with disadvantaged children.

Computing's Evert Lombaert recently met with the Trust's Chief Digital & Information Officer, Alan Crawford, discussing his duties at the organisation and Shaw Trust's work to bring young people into IT.

"It's very much a change agent role, currently," said Crawford, referring to his work following the Trust's recent acquisition of two ‘quasi-commercial' bodies: Prospects Group and Ixion Holdings. The merger of these two with Shaw Education Trust, Forth Sector, Disabled Living Foundation and Shaw Trust formed the Shaw Trust Group, which employs almost 3,200 staff and has a total turnover of £250 million.

"It's a genuine merger, from a technology perspective," he continued, "where we're going to take the three teams and the strategy is very much to go all-in on the Microsoft cloud."

Shaw Trust was already using Azure prior to the merger, and is now moving Prospects and Ixion to the same. "That's for hosting, for Office 365, for CRMs, but also for websites."

The move to Microsoft required the Trust to balance efficiency against securing the delicate data of nearly 1 million vulnerable individuals around the world. "[All of Microsoft's services] are very compatible and very secure, which is key for us," Crawford said.

He added, "[With] the strategy of moving to the cloud, I actually think we can enhance security through that, by having all of our data in one location and making sure we really harden the access… We focus on the security of the data, not necessarily the security of the location or the device."

Also in the video, Crawford discusses the trust's reasons for embracing IT specifically in improving the job skills of disabled beneficiaries, while also touching upon the Trust's recent launch of the British UK IT Challenge, benefiting disabled youths keen on embracing IT careers.