Fragmentation could be the consequence of poor management of cloud services.
A technology expert has warned that chief information officers (CIOs) are risking losing touch with their companies if they do not manage cloud computing more effectively.
Speaking to Computer Weekly, Gartner analyst Tapati Bhandopadhyay explained that some departments will already be looking into such services themselves, potentially leading to fragmentation within companies.
She recommended that CIOs need to take the initiative and invest in service management skills first, sharing them with the rest of their colleagues straight away afterwards.
"Infrastructure and Operations [I&O] needs to be proactive and comfortable with cloud. They need to have the kind of process and people maturity to deliver the capacity and functionality that a public cloud service can provide," Ms Bhandopadhyay commented.
If this does not happen, organisations will find it difficult to track demand for IT services and so may make mistakes in capacity planning that can lead to dissatisfaction among clients.
Compliance and regulatory risks can also take place, especially in highly governance sectors such as finance, the expert warned.
Ms Bhandopadhyay suggested investing more in cloud computing and then effectively training each member of staff to use it properly.
Gartner recently found that the average I&O department scores just two out of five for managing processes – three is the minimum for effective cloud service delivery, so many companies may still not be getting things right in terms of technology.
"The kind of transformation that cloud needs, the investment it needs, is quite significant, in terms of time, money and effort," Ms Bhandopadhyay concluded.
It comes after a recent poll by Computing magazine found that two-thirds of respondents in medium or large organisations have already adopted some form of cloud computing such as offsite backup storage.
However, only one in 20 of those polled said they currently have more than half of their entire operations in the cloud.
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