The Cloud is an exciting place right now and there are areas of growth that anyone involved, however tangentially, should know about. We have compiled a list of three of the most important upcoming trends.
1. Cloud Budgets
A third of all businesses run a Cloud budget of between two
and a half million dollars and twelve million dollars. Things like AI, IoT,
CaaS, etc. are growing in popularity, lending truth to the claims that Cloud is
swiftly becoming a major focus for IT departments.
There is an inordinate amount of waste currently happening
in the Cloud and, now that it is being identified, streamlining is finally
happening.
Without an understanding of your strengths and weaknesses,
you cannot make use of the solutions out there at your disposal. Without
knowledge of your own situation, you cannot reduce your budget. Optimisation
means improving your unique situation with tools that enhance said situation.
If you try to cut corners and lowball the budget, which most businesses usually do by a quarter, this deepens difficulties where there should be elegant solutions to these difficulties.
2. Multicloud or Hybrid Cloud
Moving from physical servers to multiple Cloud vendors is a
large undertaking and can seem daunting at first, until it is underway. As the
Cloud is entrusted with more and more of a business’ information and workload,
the increase in multi-cloud is increasing exponentially.
Cloud-native will replace the need for providers.
Organisations will gain a greater understanding of what they require, what is
available and what needs to be developed, in order to get to where they know
they can. Capabilities within the Cloud will always, of course, impact this but
with the technology now catching up to the ambitions, companies can move with
great agility toward the next trend.
Investment in this will always be ongoing as there will
regularly be updated technology, offering the chance of further savings and
shortcuts. Functionality and ways to reduce risk will always be things worth
investing in and striving for.
Hybrid Cloud offers the best of both the public and private Cloud, depending on what your company needs at a specific time. Balance is the keyword here, allowing you to benefit from the flexibility of the public Cloud while enjoying the compliance and efficiency of the private
3. Cloud.Sustainability
Values are how organisations are being increasingly viewed
by their customers. Sustainability and a prioritisation of the environment
signals to prospective clients that you have real values and 4/5 of consumers
feel this is an issue of great importance.
While a net-zero future is being touted, how does this relate to the Cloud? Migrating infrastructure to the Cloud can result in a saving in energy and carbon emissions of over 50%. Evaluating processes and migrating the most resource-heavy processes off physical servers and onto the Cloud is where the savings happen, and where you show your savvy plus your sustainability bone fides.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
It really adds up to treat your team like human beings
A business which conducts itself with purpose and
professionalism naturally elevates itself above the competition. A relentless
drive to increase in size in order to satisfy shareholders can serve to reduce
the people who work there to figures, robots even.
Whether a company chooses to take this route or not, will
define its future. Thankfully, more companies are adopting the path towards a
mission that is not just based on money, but on treating employees with
respect, acknowledging that they hold the keys to the future of the business.
Seeking meaning through actions is what humans do, and work
is no different. Yes, we all want to be sufficiently recompensed for our time,
and perks are nice to have too, but the realising of potential and a sense of
contributing meaningfully are major factors in the long-term mental well-being
of employees. Allowing workers to learn and grow means the good of the company
goes beyond fulfilling the goals of the business but can emerge out into the
society around it, benefitting those who may be outside of the immediate area
of influence.
When it comes to recruitment, it is easy to spot employers
who are engaged. It can be as simple as hiring managers replying to emails or
responding to candidate resumes in a timely fashion. For all the sound and fury
surrounding the search for new prospects to fill job roles, if what follows the
flurry of activity is the metaphorical sound of crickets, a specialist
recruitment partner starts to begin to understand why the hiring has been a long
drawn out process so far.
But just because an employer isn’t engaged with these issues
doesn’t mean they don’t want to be. It can be difficult asking for help when
you don’t really know what kind of help you need or how to go about starting
the process.
Finding support throughout this can be hard, if you are
starting from scratch, as an organisation has either made steps towards being
responsive and responsible, or it hasn’t. If it hasn’t, then it can feel like
an uphill struggle. All companies make noises about listening to their
employees but the difference between intending to do something and actually
going through with it, is huge.
Processes and systems need to be in place, and putting them
there takes time. Companies can and do change but change is often slow-paced.
Relationships can be complex and there may be a lot to unpack.
Having an experienced specialist recruitment expert onside
can help greatly. They will have experience of sorting the strategy for
onboarding new candidates within your sector, will possess knowledge of the
values shared by all of the different generations you may be recruiting and
they can promote your new way of doing things to the candidates as if they are
an external observer.
Within Data, AI and Cloud, it is important to view new
technology as a way to enhance the potential of your workforce rather than a
way of enslaving them to an omnipresent company presence. There will always be
doubters who misunderstand the aims, or those who are old-school who attempt to
mould what is happening to fit their standard worldview. Specialist recruitment
partners are outside and have a better overview of how things are going and
where things may be going wrong.
Responsive businesses will treat all the people in and
around the business with dignity, pays fairly, challenges and reassesses its
values in the face of criticism, develops an environment of accountability and nurturing
where people can thrive and will help the company thrive, in return.
Companies must adapt during these times. Showing
appreciation, encouragement and consideration is not a weakness. Getting fully
involved in the recruitment should not draw you away from your current
responsibilities. If you have the right help on your side, these problems will
not even be a concern anymore.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
When your best employees are packing their boxes, you need to take action
One of the most interesting trends affecting recruitment recently has been the large wave of resignations so we thought it would be a good time to highlight and discuss this trend.
With resignation rates spiking, and the trend not looking to
slow down any time soon, companies are having to deal with recruiting problems
from multiple sources. Not only are there resignations, but candidates are
harder to find, seeing as the power balance has swung back to the candidates
and away from the employers, a fact a lot of businesses are still failing to
get to grips with.
Voluntary turnover, especially in industries like tech,
means replacements must be sourced from somewhere, somehow. This could indicate
that they are being poached but in a field such as Cloud computing, experts are
thin on the ground and can only be sourced by recruiters who know what they are
looking for.
Plans for returning to the office, which are always
up-in-the-air, have not yet happened fully to the degree that some businesses
need. Working from home seems to be returning and looks like it will not go
away any time soon. Burn out was a key reason for high turnover in the past 18
months but now it is about choice.
The brightest and best are leaving companies at a staggering
rate, leaving those companies desperately scrabbling for replacements that
match the calibre of ones who have just exited, and this impacts profits. Yes,
there is always going to be turnover, but as turnover accelerates, instability
within an organisation ensues.
A workforce empowered can make demands in a market that is bouncing back, so those who do not agree with the company’s ethos and no longer feel, or never have felt, valued will vote with their feet and walk. As we have said before, millennials and gen Z are looking for respect, meaningful work and good communication. Job satisfaction matters but why is it so difficult for businesses to comprehend this fact?
Research shows that trust is at the forefront of the new
employee experience and if an organisation cannot prove itself trustworthy,
then seasoned employees will leave and new ones will not join. WFH has
exacerbated an already strained relationship, with communication breaking down
and the company’s belief system being tested and found wanting on some
occasions.
Employees who have recently considered their own mortality
recently have now decided that life is too short to work in a job that makes
them miserable. Management who demand unrealistic workloads from their workers
or who undermine their employees’ authority on issues of which they are the
expert can grind away good will. To avoid this, managers must empathise with
their employees.
The expectation that, if an employee is working from home,
that they are available whenever they are needed, which leads to a workday with
no clearly-defined end-point, will inevitably lead to burn out and resentment.
With no workmates around to chat to and vent about the problem, it festers.
Productivity is also under the microscope these days, as the
past definition and measurements do not hold muster with the newer generations.
What is generally lacking is a result based culture with clearly defined
outcome measurements and a standardised assessment framework, rather than a
haphazard system based around how many hours have been worked.
By appreciating the old and new pressures their employees were under, managers can stem the flow of workers exiting the business and by building career development into each role, they can give some hope to those who are under their care.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
Those looking for agility in these trying times are focusing
more and more on the Cloud. The scalability that it offers has allowed
businesses to grow or contract their IT needs throughout the Covid-19 pandemic,
with other companies noticing the benefits and building it into their future
plans.
Those future plans are not considered, by those who
understand the process, as a silver bullet. This is about working out your
company’s goal and figuring out how the cloud can aid those goals. This is a
marathon, not a sprint.
Optimising decentralised workplaces has become a priority
during the Covid-19 pandemic, with workers requiring access and the ability to
share SaaS (Software as a Service) and data while working from home. Remote
working is not the only reason, with largescale data projects, previously
stalled, starting up again and requiring scalable server space.
Public cloud continues to grow with a 35% growth expected
this year and at least 28% next year with spend increasing 18%. These numbers
may well grow as the cloud has been validated during the Covid-19 crisis.
SaaS, PaaS (Platform as a Service) and IaaS (Infrastructure
as a Service) will experience high growth. SaaS will grow to minimise the drain
on computers by moving the heavy lifting to the cloud and enhance shareability
across different locations. PaaS will grow thanks to new cloud-native apps, as
businesses wake up to how much of their infrastructure can be assigned to the
cloud. IaaS is expected to increase over 26%. The financial benefits are also
helping exacerbate this shift.
Alibaba Cloud, the new contender amongst the large public
cloud providers, was making gains to displace one of the big three (Google
Cloud, Microsoft Azure & Amazon Web Services), but has been rocked by
allegations of a data leak that happened in 2019, which has landed them in hot
water and damaged confidence.
The big three continue to go from strength to strength, with
Google and Microsoft levelling up against the former top dog, Amazon.
Google Cloud has focused on becoming more business-friendly
with enhanced account and analytics management. It is expected that it will
expect around 50% growth in the coming year. Amazon Web Services will use the
main company’s software and services to help it grow larger still. Microsoft
has a brand trust that Google and Amazon struggle to match, which is fuelling
its growth.
On the horizon, is the dawn of joint cloud and multi-cloud
providers. This is a way for smaller or less established companies to take on
Amazon and offer users a ‘best of both worlds’ approach, highlighting their own
particular specialities and mutual strengths to reassure those signing up, that
this is the best option.
Previously the idea was considered crazy and just bad
business, but as time has moved on, and multi-cloud has emerged as a
possibility, with many providers reconsidering and accepting that there is
enough demand to warrant this route.
The Oracle Cloud-Microsoft Azure team up is an obvious example of two companies that can work independently in the cloud if needed, but who have combined to make the most of Microsoft Machine Learning and Oracle’s network.
There is so much happening with the Cloud right now and if your company is expanding in this area, you are going to need a great team. Bear Zenshin Talent in mind as a trusted recruitment partner.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
A question that can literally cloud people’s minds
As we recruit for Data Science, Artificial Intelligence,
Machine Learning and Cloud, we are often asked by hiring managers to explain
the jargon. We thought we would focus on the confusion around the Cloud.
For those thinking there are some ‘dark arts’ surrounding
the cloud, we assure you that the subject is not complex, there are just a few
different varieties of things like deployment, and within deployment there are
a few varieties of hybrid cloud.
‘The Cloud’
The joke going around is that no one knows what the cloud is
and where it is, it just IS. There is no real mystery once you know what it is.
It is basically normal computer architecture involving real servers, only it is
now available over the internet and the servers are worldwide.
Cloud Storage
This is essentially the storage of an app or data or a file
on the internet. You do it all the time on something like Google Docs. You
upload your file to store it and then anyone you give access to it can access
it. In business terms, it is generally used to store and share business
documents. Some businesses use the cloud solely to store their information,
while others use it for infrastructure purposes, which takes us into…
Cloud Computing
The confusion usually comes with cloud computing, as it has
a few varieties of deployment.
For ‘Public Cloud’, Microsoft Azure, Google GCP and Amazon AWS
are the big names within this space. They are huge and easily scalable, suited
to collaborations. You may want to take advantage of an Infrastructure as a
Service (IaaS) to store your data or process it, or use a Software as a Service
(SaaS) so the processing is away from your internal infrastructure.
Public Cloud does not require a lot of money, you don’t need
a physical infrastructure, you can scale up when you need more, you have
advanced security thanks to your provider. Having said that, you are beholden
to your provider too, so if their security is lacking, yours will be too.
The ‘Private Cloud’ is a cloud which is ringfenced and
firewalled for use by one organisation to store info and access from anywhere.
This can give greater peace of mind but also more headaches as it can only
scale up with the addition of more servers, which makes it more expensive.
‘Community Cloud’ is specifically for similar organisations
or those within the same industry to share the server space for similar tasks.
It is a private that acts like it is public. It benefits those involved because
they are all in the same boat, so to speak. The downside is that with everyone
being equal, prioritisation and privacy can be a concern, meaning this model is
not for everyone.
A ‘Hybrid Cloud’ offers both of the above options at the
same time, with public and private co-existing when needed, and it comes in two
varieties. One type augments the private cloud with the public cloud for
scaling up. The other runs some non-critical apps on public while the bulk of
the important work is on the private cloud. Of course, you must find a provider
who is adept at the hybrid model or you will run into difficulties.
So now you know about Cloud, you can chat about it with ease. If you are recruiting for Cloud projects and you need a recruitment partner, don’t hesitate to contact us here at Zenshin.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
If your company is hiring people to work on the Cloud e.g.
Cloud Data Analysts, it is important that you understand what you are looking
for, as well as the specialist recruiter who is helping you. Job specs are a
very important element in your search for the prime candidate and if the
incorrect one is sent out, it makes your life so much harder in the long run.
So many people labour under the misapprehension that the
Cloud is merely a back-up for things that exist outside of the Cloud. This is
understandable as that is how it is discussed generally but the truth is more
complicated than that.
The more information we create, the need to store it and
move it around more easily, becomes more and more important. So virtual servers
are required in order to store this data. You don’t need to know where it is
exactly as long as you know it is safe.
This way of doing things gives you the advantage of
expanding and contracting your infrastructure when you need it. This lends flexibility
to a business, and the cost savings, especially for start-ups, can be a
godsend. Changing to subscriptions and having the stress of hardware taken away
helps make the business more agile.
If you already knew all of this, great. Now how are you
going to target and hire these professionals?
Firstly, your existing team needs to research and introduce
the best fit in terms of Cloud, creating strategies for the adoption of this
solution and creating an environment where Cloud is accepted as the next step
for the company while also keeping an eye on security concerns.
If you don’t have that help readily available within the
company, the next choice is an outside recruitment consultant who has Cloud and
data team experience. Ideally a specialist willing to work in a dedicated
partnership fashion. They will have the experience, relationships and systems
to find the hidden gems.
With many companies waking up to Cloud, there is so much
more demand for those same candidates, in addition to new projects coming back
online after the stalling during Covid-19. This is one of the most important
reasons for the need for correct targeting, including focused job specs. If you
get that part wrong, you waste time during the hiring process and miss out on
prospects who gravitate toward companies who have their ducks in a row.
During these periods of popularity of new or newish roles,
there is a tendency for organisations to start hiring straight from
universities because they are the candidates that they can easily find, but
that is not the way forward. Of course, the next generation needs to get their
start somewhere, but they are not experienced enough at this point. Once you
have your team of seniors secured, you should then be looking for the new blood
to bring through.
The approach must be specific and those who make the
approaches should know enough about Cloud to be able to sell your companies
Cloud plan with confidence and also to spot the difference between the new
starter and the pro.
The world is moving to the Cloud, that is undeniable. You need to understand and engage with it. Making the correct choice when it comes to hiring always saves time and money, so if it feels like Cloud hiring is something you are struggling to get to grips with, look to those who can do it. It makes perfect sense.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
