How Cloud-Based Workload Automation Saves You Time and Money

It’s widely recognized that the future of IT lies in the cloud. But in many ways, the cloud has already arrived.

Only a decade ago, most organizations still housed the bulk of their tech stack on premises. Fast forward to today, and the most critical operational technology—from core accounting and HR systems to front-end, customer-facing tools—has moved to the cloud. This is a leading reason why Gartner forecasts worldwide end-user spending on public cloud services alone to grow by over 20 percent in 2023, to $591.8 billion.

These investments increased during the pandemic, and there are few signs the trend is slowing down. According to an October 2021 Harris Poll conducted on behalf of Microsoft, respondents reported an insatiable appetite for cloud-based solutions, anticipating multi-cloud adoption increasing by 67% and hybrid cloud by 72% over the next one to two years.

The rapid migration of technology from on-premises servers to the cloud is driving a growing need for mature workload automation and orchestration solutions capable of managing such disparate, complex, and diverse systems. Fortunately, cloud automation is a solution that’s uniquely positioned to handle this daunting challenge.

Workloads are moving to the cloud

As more processes move from on-premises servers and software to the cloud—research from Spiceworks Ziff Davis found that 50 percent of all business workloads will run in the cloud by 2023—it’s introducing new challenges for IT executives. Moreover, these pain points grow ever-more acute as multi-cloud, hybrid cloud, and mixed technology environments are introduced. Such environments are enormously complex, and the growing demand for cloud resources is adding urgency and unpredictability to the equation, making the continued application of human-facilitated management virtually impossible.

In a 2020 study from Dynatrace, nearly three-quarters of CIOs said, “the growing use of cloud-based native technologies and platforms will lead to more manual effort and time spent ‘keeping the lights on.’” In addition, 63 percent of CIOs reported that their cloud environments have “surpassed human ability to manage.”

Today’s typical IT tech stack consists of literally hundreds of cloud-based and virtual resources. In such complex environments, it becomes increasingly difficult to ensure systems are properly integrated and able to speak to each other, as well as to manage efficient load balancing and distribution of network traffic across a multitude of servers.

The manual effort involved in such activities is time and resource intensive, frequently resulting in higher error rates, system downtime, and service interruptions. This, in turn, affects both internal and external customers—all of which adds to the ballooning costs of IT.

The case for cloud automation

As cloud technology continues its inevitable march forward, it’s becoming increasingly beneficial from a time, resources, and financial standpoint to automate and orchestrate workloads in the cloud as well.

Cloud-based workload automation and orchestration (WLA&O) offers the following benefits:

• Save time—Through the automation of repetitive and manual tasks—such as provisioning resources, scaling and monitoring applications, and backup and recovery— cloud automation reduces the need for manual intervention, which can be both time consuming and error prone.
• Increase agility and flexibility—Cloud automation is adept at automating processes across multiple cloud and on-premises environments. And through the use of pre-built APIs, it also enables seamless integration across multiple, diverse systems hosted in public, private, and hybrid clouds.
• Unbeatable scalability—Cloud-based solutions can automatically scale resources up or down based on demand by deploying and decommissioning servers as needed, without any manual intervention. This can be especially beneficial during peak volume periods like tax season, weekly and monthly payroll, and benefit pay days, when organizations may experience a surge in customer activity. It also allows organizations to do exponentially more with the same team. By using cloud-based WLA&O, organizations always have the resources they need to handle increased demand, without making large upfront investments in on-premises infrastructure.
• Better reliability—Cloud automation by design reduces the number and complexity of manual processes, resulting in fewer errors, more uptime, and fewer service interruptions.
• Cost savings—Because cloud workload automation solutions are typically offered on a pay-as-you-go model, organizations only pay for the resources they use. In contrast, maintaining on-prem solutions typically means investing in expensive infrastructure and ongoing maintenance costs. Additionally, cloud providers typically handle the burden of software maintenance and updates, so IT departments don't have to cover these additional costs.
• Enhance business continuity and disaster recovery—With cloud automation, all critical applications and data are automatically and securely backed up and protected. In the case of a natural disaster or other major business interruption, mission-critical operations will continue as normal.
• Better security and compliance—As highly regulated businesses, financial services organizations are subject to various regulations and standards depending on jurisdiction, such as the worldwide Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe. Many cloud providers have a team of security experts on staff to help institutions meet these regulations and standards, and they also have multiple layers of security in place to protect customer and member data.

Cloud automation is an investment in the future

Cloud-based WLA&O allows IT departments to eliminate the costs of expensive IT hardware, software licensing fees, and additional staff to support on-premises infrastructure. The solution provides you with everything you need at a lower overall cost of operation, while ensuring you are always on the latest version, so you’ll save time on software upgrades.

Best yet, cloud automation will help you scale and adapt as your business needs evolve. No more worrying about maintaining or upgrading your processing and storage capacity to manage increased workloads. Leading workload automation providers handle all of that for you, freeing up time for you and your staff to focus on growing, rather than maintaining, your business.

As the majority of workloads migrate to the cloud, it’s time to ensure your automation solution can handle the complex demands of this new world. Cloud-based workload automation and orchestration is the solution designed to meet the needs of today, and the future.