I recently conducted a presentation to local CFO’s about Cloud based software. The interesting piece in that discussion was the general lack of knowledge of the following:
- Where is “the cloud”?
- Why is the cloud a good idea for my business management software?
- What about security in the cloud?
- Who owns the data?
Part of my presentation is “You are already cloudy! “ If you outsource payroll, if you access bank accounts on the internet, if you stream music and videos, you are using the cloud! Never thought about it, right? Have you thought about where the cloud is for your bank or payroll services? Have you thought about the security surrounding these services? There are a lot of questions you should be asking but I am sure are taken for granted.
- Does the provider have a redundant servers so that if one is down for some reason, another picks up with no loss to you?
- Does the provider “push out” updates to your data automatically or do you have the option to review first?
- Who owns the data—you or the provider? This should be stipulated in your contract.
- Can you get your data if you decide to go someplace else?
- If you can get your data, in what format will the data be provided ?
I am sure there are more and if you would like to get a better understanding of your options, let us know, we would be glad to help!
