“You cannot manage what you cannot measure; and what gets measured gets done.”
— William Hewlett, co-founder of Hewlett-Packard

Cloud computing — that facility for outsourcing data processing — has been key to many cost efficiencies that businesses have been leveraging for a couple of years now. And because it enables organizations to make sense of huge volumes of data in a short amount of time, cloud computing is changing management.

Organizing and planning

Where there were once disparate systems for different departments, everything can now be streamlined to work under one holistic system. Cloud-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) software allows firms to standardize their tools and processes so that data can course through the organization without worries about compatibility or interoperability issues.

This is possible because everything can be centralized in the cloud. Data storage can be done in the cloud. The software programs and even entire operating systems you use can also be hosted in the cloud. You can even go so far as to build your entire IT infrastructure upon it, too.

By putting everything in a centralized system, departmental strategies can be seen with the whole organization in mind, and organization-wide strategies are formed through better collaboration among stakeholders.

Leading

As an organization grows, teams within it can drift apart and even come up with goals that are contrary to one another. It is the leader’s job to unify them under a common cause and to motivate them to fulfill their roles.

Organizations can use cloud-based platforms such as Microsoft Teams to weave communication channels across the company and disseminate company news, enculturate corporate values, and set up informal sources of inspiration for everyone.

Controlling

By consolidating data processes in the cloud, businesses can derive operational insights quickly. For instance, historical analytics can reveal where bottlenecks impede production, while predictive analytics can identify upcoming trends and the threats and opportunities that come along with them.

The cloud also enables managers to collect customer feedback regarding user experience at a massive scale, distill meaningful insights from it at a rapid pace, and introduce new product or service features long before competitors who use old-fashioned feedback loops (such as focus groups) do. Ever wondered how your favorite apps get quick updates all the time? Now you know it’s all thanks to an iterative approach that’s powered by the cloud.

Actionable insights are key to pivoting the company to new directions in response to changes in the market, but so are flexibility and efficiency. To illustrate, scaling up and down an in-house data center according to anticipated workload shifts is difficult and expensive, but this isn’t the case with the cloud. If you need more computing resources, storage space, and other features, all you have to do is call your provider.

Furthermore, let’s say that you need to shift from soon-to-be unsupported legacy software to new ones. The cloud enables automated updates and upgrades, freeing you up to tackle more pressing concerns.

Beyond being affordable, cloud computing is changing management as an amazing tool that helps business managers organize, plan, lead, and control their operations. To learn how you too can leverage the cloud to improve your bottom line, give our consultants at SimplyClouds a call today.