Cloud Migration Moves Slowly But Surely in Government Sector

Key findings show federal employees’ reliance on the cloud continues to grow at a rapid pace, but oversight over migration and consolidation remains inconsistent.
survey, from the Government Business Council (GBC), Government Executive Media Group’s research division, in collaboration with Deloitte, assessed the federal government’s progress in data reorganization. It found that more than 41 percent of respondents indicate progress in moving their agency’s applications to the cloud, with an additional 9 percent planning to migrate soon.
While more federal agencies are moving to the cloud, top incentives for cloud migration continue to be cost-savings (30 percent), organizational efficiency (28 percent) and data-sharing (28 percent). The ability of cloud offerings to facilitate more modern technology, such as SaaS and mobile, are largely unknown by respondents (68 percent and 57 percent, respectively).
More than 69 percent of respondents require cloud access to produce successful work. However, 24 percent cite dissatisfaction with their agency’s cloud offerings, and awareness of cloud-first and data center consolidation initiatives remains low: 59 percent of respondents say their organization’s cloud governance is nonexistent or ineffective, and 71 percent of respondents claim to have used IT applications that fall outside the toolkit of approved applications provided by their organization. More than 35 percent say these practices occur on a frequent to occasional basis.
“How the cloud is used – governance, tech enablement and organizational factors – will determine the success of cloud adoption,” said Doug Bourgeois, managing director, Deloitte Consulting, and federal cloud leader. “The power of the cloud to advance the federal government’s use of new technology seems widely unknown. While cost and efficiency benefits are well understood, these other cloud capabilities can help the federal government adopt next generation tech much faster – and unleash the tremendous untapped potential of cloud investments.”
GBC randomly sampled 536 federal employees for this survey, including those at the GS/GM 11-15 pay levels and members of the Senior Executive Service. Respondents include representatives from at least 29 federal and defense agencies.