by Rich Bourdeau
You have decided to purchase an off-the-shelf cloud automation solution. The next 
challenge is finding software that is flexible enough to meet your needs but can be deployed quickly to demonstrate value to the business.
Time to value of your cloud automation solution is critical to achieving management and business support for continued investment in your “as-a-service” delivery framework. However, if the solution does not meet the needs of the business, just because it is deployed quickly does not guarantee adoption.
Inflexible Cloud Automation Tools
There are many cloud automation solutions out there that advertise simple, easy and quick 
cloud deployments. Many of these solutions were built for a specific problem like lab management; they have prescribed processes, limited interoperability, and lack extensibility features that are needed to adapt to more broad scale deployment requirements. Other tools are focused exclusively on automating Infrastructure services for their specific infrastructure.
Any cloud automation solution which requires drastic changes to existing management tools, infrastructure components, or operational processes will result in both additional capital costs required to replace existing technology as well as additional investment in people to be able to use this new technology and processes. The other challenge that we have seen is that your company will likely not be able to achieve the savings you have envisioned because the automation solution will not meet the needs of the various businesses. These businesses will stay with their current manual process or look to public cloud solutions to meet their needs. The other alternative is that each group will implement a completely different cloud automation solution which does not provide your company with the operational scalability they could have with a single integrated solution.
As you ponder your cloud automation decision, simple, quick and easy does not always achieve the best long term results. That simplicity needs to be balanced by flexibility and scalability if you want to satisfy the needs of your business. In our next blog post on selecting a cloud automation solution we will explore why flexibility is an important attribute and what capabilities you should be looking for.
Learn more about VMware’s Cloud Automation solution:
- Watch the VMware IT Private Cloud – Exceeding Expectations video (2:28 min)
- Learn using the VCloud Automation 6.x Video Library
- Try HOL-SDC-1321 – vCloud Automation Center 6 from A to Z
- Check out what some of our customers are saying in the customer case studies on our web site.
Need help deploying your private cloud infrastructure or developing your business justification? Contact us and our experts can help your team build the business case and the solution to maximize your IT productivity.
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