As I meet with Symantec customers and partners to talk about some of the impacts that cloud computing is having (or may have) on their businesses, I hear time and time again about the importance of data and about the fact that the governance and information security & management policy that surrounds data will be key to ensuring successful transitions to new computing and service delivery models.
In almost every case, though, the organisation that I am speaking to is struggling with the same problem.... Where on earth do I start with all of this ?
I hear a lot of potential answers to this question ("data classification", "virtualization", "service level agreements", etc..). For me, these are all too technical and specific as a first step to the creation of a cloud computing strategy (or any IT strategy for that matter !). In my training (a good few years ago now) in the...