Advanced multi-cloud users benefit, but barriers still abound

Image courtesy of Isa Boog.

The most common multi-cloud barrier for organisations is a shortage of cloud skills, indicating that attracting, nurturing, and retaining engineering talent remains an industry-wide challenge, according to HashiCorp.

HashiCorp commissioned Forrester Consulting for a survey of nearly 1,000 technology practitioners and decision-makers in a variety of industries around the world. 

Results highlighted that high-maturity organisations benefit most in the areas of security, governance, reliability, and cost.

More than half (55%) of respondents boosted cloud spending in the last year. Despite an uncertain macroeconomic environment, over half of respondents continue to increase investment in cloud spending. 

Nearly all report opportunities to optimise that spend, and over half of mature organisations say their multi-cloud strategy is actually helping them save money.

More than nine in every 10 (93%) of high cloud maturity organisations say multi-cloud is working, and 70% say multi-cloud is helping them reach business goals while 16% say they expect it to in the next year. 

Skills shortages ranked as the top multi-cloud barrier. Respondents of all maturity levels noted that the lack of skilled cloud talent is the most common issue, hindering companies’ ability to operationalise multi-cloud. 

Mature organisations have a key advantage, however, with 71% saying their multi-cloud strategy helps them attract, motivate, and retain talent.

Security ranked as the top multi-cloud benefit. Among respondents, security is ranked the top factor in multi-cloud success and the most common benefit from a multi-cloud strategy. 

While multi-cloud clearly can create security challenges, working in multiple cloud environments can also help organisations keep their security professionals engaged, and also be a forcing function toward more intentional oversight of their security operations.

All high-maturity organisations rely on platform teams. Platform teams are clearly becoming an essential component of the enterprise cloud-adoption journey. 

Every high-maturity respondent across the entire global survey said their organisation uses platform teams. And 95% of all APAC respondents rely on platform teams.

“While low-maturity organisations face difficulties in staffing, security, and costs, high-maturity organisations are able to use their multi-cloud approach to attract and retain talent, implement platform teams, save money, and improve security,” said Armon Dadgar, co-founder and CTO of HashiCorp. 

“The data confirm that as organisations progress along their cloud adoption journey, they realise important benefits that improve both technical and business outcomes,” said Dadgar.