- [Alana] Hey there. In this video, we're going to talk about-- (email alert) Oh, uh, one second. I'm getting an email from my customers, Alice and Bob, who are part of an organization that's starting its cloud-adoption journey. Let me give you a little background here. Some organizations simply start with their cloud adoption by just moving a single workload to the cloud, which gives them a lot of flexibility and confidence to migrate other workloads. This is what we refer to as a transactional strategy. However, what Alice and Bob's organization is doing is called a transformational cloud-adoption strategy, where the organization goes all in on the cloud. And, in return, they achieve greater economies of scale, savings, and a better understanding of their cloud footprint upfront. With that in mind, let's see what the email says. "Dear Alana, We've decided on AWS "as our cloud service provider, "and we want to get the most out of cloud, "but we're at the very beginning of our cloud migration "and we don't know how to set ourselves up for success. "We don't have any clear or actionable guidance "on best practices for cloud adoption from our organization. "What should we do? "Signed sincerely, Alice and Bob." Now, this is an important question, and I can either go two ways with it. I can either A, suggest that they define that guidance and give them some information on how to do that. Or B, suggest that they quit their jobs and hope someone else does it. The answer I'm leaning towards is A. More than just defining the best practices, they need to create an entire cloud migration roadmap that takes in consideration all aspects of the organization. In fact, AWS can even collaborate and provide inputs to create this roadmap. We can help establish baseline estimates for deliverables in areas such as training, budgeting for cloud, governance and oversight, and more. We can provide guidance for migrating business critical applications, legacy applications, and even entire data centers. And we can also help them create operational checklists and recommend steps on how to get started, so that Alice and Bob don't miss any key steps and deliverables. All right, I've sent that answer back to Alice and Bob, and they seem pleased with the response, but they asked me a new question. The email reads, "Dear Alana, Our organization can be resistant to change, "but we need to drive enablement throughout the company "and make sure that important stakeholders "have a say in how we do that. "Do you have any suggestions on how to make this happen?" Hmm, well, I'm thinking they should create an internal team to prepare for and drive their cloud migration. This practice is really common, and it's generally recommended by AWS. This internal team they would create is called a Cloud Center of Excellence. And its main goal is to enable developers to have a say in decisions that affect the direction of the cloud migration. All right, let's send them that response. (email alert) Oh wow, they've already responded back to me. Okay, next problem that Alice and Bob are facing. They noticed in my email that I said a Center of Excellence is generally recommended. Now they're asking if there's any sort of framework that has common cloud migration activities or best practices that they can use. There's two pieces of information I can give them here. The first thing I want to tell them about is that AWS has the AWS Cloud Adoption Framework, also called AWS CAF, that will help identify those migration activities and best practices, to ensure their migration and cloud adoption goes smoothly. In fact, the AWS Professional Services team often works with customers to create an AWS CAF Action Plan to help them prepare for the transition, uncover gaps in skills or processes, and generally help you guide the transition. The second piece of information I want them to know about is the AWS Cloud Adoption Readiness Tool, or CART. It's a 16-question online survey and assessment report that details migration readiness across six different perspectives, including business, people, process, platform, operations, and security. After they finish the survey, Alice and Bob can download the results, which includes a heatmap and radar chart with scoring information, and resources that will help them improve their readiness score. Alice and Bob can use this to communicate with our stakeholders, and plan for any additional changes. I'll include the link to the readiness assessment in the email I'm sending to them, and you can find it in the reading after this video. All right, I've pressed send. Hmm! Alice and Bob haven't responded immediately, so, I guess it's time for me to take a lunch break. But maybe they're not responding because they're overwhelmed. Let me send them one last email. "Dear Alice and Bob, "A cloud migration is not just a technical feat, "but also an organizational one. "If you need additional support, "you can even use an AWS Migration Competency Partner "to help you through every step of the migration. "They'll provide you with personnel, tools, and education "to ensure that you get the results you want. "These AWS Partners are part of our AWS Partner Network "and have achieved the Migration Partner designation, "which means they've been evaluated "on their skill and expertise, as well as completion "of multiple large-scale migrations to AWS. "Best of luck, Alana." Now, a lot of this information I've told Alice and Bob is self service on the AWS website. And a quick search might yield them faster results than them reaching out to me. But when customers like Alice or Bob, or you, do need help, the best person at AWS to contact is your sales representative, or your AWS Partner. By looping your AWS sales rep, or AWS Partners, into the discussion, they can provide a lot of additional information and value. Wait, what was I going to talk about in this video? Well, never mind now. Guess it's lunch time! See you soon.
