re: We have our heads in The Cloud

Paul — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 09:39:00 GMT

Not the place for a Microsoft Sales Pitch. MS are already beating us up with Cloud propaganda and this isn't the place to do it!

re: We have our heads in The Cloud

Peter — Sat, 16 Oct 2010 20:13:55 GMT

I understand the whole "technology isn't our business" argument, but I don't understand why it should apply only to IT.

Why not apply that logic to every part of the business that isn't "our primary business" and outsource everything? Using your example, why send out invoices? I'm a shoe guy, not a bookkeeper. Why have a mail room? I'm a shoe guy, not a delivery guy. Why answer my phones? I'm a shoe guy, not a receptionist. Why have office space? I'm a shoe guy not a landlord.

The reason why is that you can't always boil a business down to one single thing and say that is your core business and everything else is a secondary annoyance. There are always going to be other things that aren't core to your business, but are so tightly integrated with it, that they might as well be. There is no reason to single out IT in this regard. For many non-technology businesses, their IT infrastructure is extremely integral to what they do, even though it may not be their core business. Unless your vendors are realizing huge economies of scale, outsourcing every last thing that isn't your "core business" is going to end up costing you far more than doing it yourself and putting you further out of touch with what it takes to actually produce and deliver your product/service.

The whole spend some every month vs. spend lots periodically argument seems silly too. It's like leasing a car vs. buying one. Sure, when you buy you have huge car payments for the first few years, but after that you can go many years paying nothing (discounting maintenance, which you pay for in either case). Take the savings during those years and save it for the next large purchase. In the long run, that is going to be cheaper than paying a little every month forever. If my current infrastructure is adequate for my needs, I can run it for many, many years with just a small maintenance cost, rather than pay every month for upgrades and improvement that may provide no value to me.

If you are the kind of business that always needs or wants the latest and greatest technology, then paying each month is probably the way to go. But like leasing a car, it is a very expensive choice in the long run, and you better be sure it is providing real value to your business. If you don't always need the latest technology, then buying and running it yourself can be far cheaper in the long run since you will save huge amounts of money in the years when you are not purchasing/upgrading.