How the cloud can provide stability in a changing world

The concept of ‘wherever I lay my phone is my office' has become an integral part of modern workforce culture. The idea had taken root long before the coronavirus struck, as many of us began using our own phones, tablets, and laptops for work while traveling or in a cafe, or opted to work from home occasionally as part of a more flexible regime.

For our employers, there were productivity benefits in enabling this approach, as the once-clear barriers between office hours and ‘me time' began to fall, and many of us fielded work emails, phone calls, and other tasks on the journey home.

It made sense to use that otherwise ‘dead' time, even though it may have encroached on our sense of independence. In return, some of us could spend more time in our own spaces and/or with our own families, while still having paid employment.

A boon for IT?

There were benefits for IT hardware purchase and support costs too, once ‘the office' became more of a shared project and set of guiding principles than hundreds of computers sitting on desks in some expensive real estate.

However, for many organisations the coronavirus lockdown was the ultimate test and proof of concept for this way of working - and it continues to be just that. It demonstrated that the perimeter of any organisation now reaches far beyond the firewall and corporate HQ.

More importantly, remote and flexible working has allowed countless organisations to keep running, continue serving customers and citizens, and maintain communications with the extended enterprise of partners and suppliers.

Not every employee or type of business can make this transition. But it's fair to say that for many of us, cloud platforms and applications have become our office spaces in this new world; they are where we meet our colleagues, share ideas, collaborate, and even host conferences and events.

A minimum viable system

As a result, many organisations are doubtless now examining what the minimum requirements might be for a viable, sustainable business that relies less and less on bricks and mortar.

This is because as we continue living with the virus and the knock-on effects of the pandemic, many of the changes in our working lives may become entrenched or even permanent.

Those of us who are not city dwellers may visit urban spaces less, or find that distancing and healthcare imperatives force us back into our own homes, at least some of the time. In the meantime, all organisations will need to keep their costs low and productivity high.

All of this demands that our cloud platforms offer predictability and stability in a fast-changing world. We can't afford for them to fail. But what about IT leaders and their teams, whose job is to keep all this technology working?

For them, our flatter and more flexible, collaborative workflows pose real challenges, because they have to continue supporting both the strategic business aims and its daily operational requirements.

On the most basic level, they have to ensure that every employee and every device that connects to central systems, applications, and data is actually supposed to be making that connection. Everyone needs to be authenticated and given access to the right applications and data they need.

Whatever device an employee is using for work, it will host, store, process, or access internal applications, data, and services, many of which may involve sensitive or privileged information. In that environment - and with so much device variety - trust, authentication, management, and security are critical.

Predictable, robust, secure

More than ever before, the IT department needs to ensure that the shared infrastructure that underpins this ‘new normal' remains robust, predictable, secure, transparent, compliant, and standards driven.

Computing spoke to 150 IT leaders in medium to large organisations across all major sectors of the economy - 100 percent of whom are professionals actively involved in using, procuring, testing, and evaluating the IT estate.

Researchers found that 73 percent of IT leaders believe keeping devices secure will become a much bigger challenge in the years ahead. Seventy-nine percent believe remote working will cause significant IT management challenges, while 77 percent say it will cause cybersecurity risks to increase.

This is why multi-factor authentication, end-to-end session encryption, and cloud-based administration are seen as the most important functions to have.

The increased diversity of devices, their geographical spread, and the volume of security patches or and updates are also seen as significant by most respondents - along with the increased workload of IT departments (no surprise there).

So, security and remote working are inextricably linked in IT leaders' minds, as risks that demand both insights and robust, agile management. However, the challenge is that many endpoint management solutions on the market today lack the ability to provide real end-to-end visibility, security, and trust. Adopting one that does is essential.

Either way, 84 percent of respondents agree that organisations need to look beyond traditional perimeter-based security, regardless of workers' locations. As we log on from our home offices, living rooms, cafes, or commuter trains, we know this to be true.

Our office is now in the cloud.