Title:Roles of Cloud Operation Management Framework in improving the ability of IT managers to manage associated organizational resources for cloud services
4.1 Research Conduct and Validation
The data collection phase for this research included the distribution of the survey through an electronic platform to the researchers immediate and extended network and targeted groups who represent the IT managers in the small/medium business who had not been included in the survey process. In order to ensure that the survey distribution process is effective, all the targeted respondents were provided with the link to the survey monkey platform which was used in the data collection process. In this case, only a single channel was used in the collection of the required data. All the respondent groups were easily accessible to the respondent as they belonged to his close contacts in the small and medium enterprises in the KUWAIT.
In the process of data collection, the steps that are used include a sampling of the relevant data and active collection process. As aforementioned, the quantitative data were collected using the questionnaire shared through the survey monkey platform. This was done through a target of the IT managers in small and medium businesses. On the other hand, the qualitative data was sourced from different users of cloud technology and the architects involved in its creation. In both the interviews and questionnaire data collection, a purposive sampling approach was followed to identify all the respondents. The sampling is a process involved in the identification of the representative group from a population of interest. As aforementioned, the study respondents were majorly the individuals involved in the implementation of cloud computing as a significant aspect of IT management. According to Onwuegbuzie and Leech (2007), purposive sampling is a process that is inclusive of the selection of potential respondents on the basis of pre-defined criteria. Owing to the significantly technical aspect of cloud computing, the primary criteria that were used involved knowledge of the computing issues in the IT industry specifically in the perspective of cloud computing. The willingness of the participants in participating in the study was equally taken into active consideration. This approach is cost effective and use minimal time in its implementation. All the potential respondents who answered the electronic questionnaire had appropriately been matched with the overall population and as such fitting to participate in the study.
The sample size of the questionnaire sourced for the study comprised of a total of 61 respondents as this is the total number that the researcher was able to reach out to issue the questionnaire. It was projected that a total of 50 respondents would successfully complete the study which is a response rate of 83%. The 50 respondents included the individuals who showed their interest in answering the issued questionnaire. The confidence interval of the findings was 9.75% which a confidence interval for a confidence level of 95%. This means that the surety of the sourced results from the analysis is a representative of appropriate population with a 9.75% margin error.
The quantitative data analysis would be analyzed by the use of SPSS software program. In this context, the analysis purpose was establishing the explanatory and casual relationships between the identified variables and measures of the study. Through the use of the software, it is possible for the researcher to calculate and identify correlations, frequency tables, and different cross-tabulations. In all the study research questions, there were distinct variables selected in the research questions and the study questionnaire. Hence, the researcher would be in a position of being in a position of anal using the relationship between the two or more variables and the differences among the quantitative and qualitative data sourced in the current study (Goertz & Mahoney, 2012). The R-value through a regression analysis was conducted to ascertain the findings of the research which was applicable in affirming the content of the study findings.
The survey reliability was done through the use of Cronbach’s alpha which is used in measuring the internal consistency reliability (Bonett & Wright, 2015). Nevertheless, critics of this approach have pointed out that the cronbach’s alpha only factor on the number of variables measured to ensure that the increasing or decreasing their number affecting the final results (Heo et al., 2015). Hence, a low value of the Cronbach’s alpha is not necessarily an appropriate indicator that the survey instrument fails in the test of unreliability. As observed by Bonett and Wright (2015), an appropriate reliability is represented by an alpha value that is 0.70 or more. In the current research, the Cronbach’s alpha was 0.78 which is an indicator of high internal consistency of the sourced data hence offering a high-level confidence of the reliability and validity of the survey instrument and the used research data.
4.2 Development of the Framework
The framework for the current study adopted a myriad of stages in its implementation. In the first step, the data sourced from the survey was analysed by following the methods highlighted in the section 4.1. Since the questionnaire was based on the best practice in transition to cloud computing and the essential resources that needed to be adopted, each set of question was crafted to attain this purpose. Further analysis was carried out for ascertaining how strong was the variables through a focus on the variance of the different responses. The detailed questionnaire analysis is as evidenced in chapter 5.
The framework was created based on the study findings and the literature review where all the aspects of processes of cloud operations, roles, and responsibilities related to cloud operations, and KPI’s to measure the success of implementations were used. The first component of cloud operations processes was done by evaluating the literature on the process of managing and delivery of the cloud services and infrastructure targeting the internal and external for the sake of satisfying the needs and expectations of customers and meeting service level agreement standards. As the literature review and the interviews with practitioners had established the existence of different resources which are instrumental in enacting the various processes which enhances an improved utilization of the cloud computing services in the different organisation practices. This equally informs on the need of generating high-level strategic recommendations for the IT managers in ensuring that they are successful in their transition from the traditional management of IT resources to a more modernized approach.
Considering the IT Artefact design from the reviewed literature and the study findings from both the interviews and questionnaires, the framework would be comprised of several processes. Includes a set of processes for cloud operations, roles, and responsibilities related to cloud operations, and KPI’s to measure the success of implementations.
4.2.1 Processes for Cloud Operations
From the reviewed literature and findings from the study, the artefact design is inclusive of the different processes undertaken for the cloud operations. These include the process of managing and delivery of cloud services and infrastructure targeting either the internal or the external user base. This is inclusive of a process of ensuring peak performance and maintaining availability for the sake of satisfying the needs and expectations of customers and meeting service level agreement standards. For instance, in the interviews that targeted the banker’s respondents, it was observed that the cloud operations offer an opportunity for providing an increased backup and recovery as a service to their clients through cloud computing. These findings are also affirmed by the reviewed literature that has suggested the big data to be inclusive of the critical reason for harnessing the increase in the cloud computing relevance in the current times (Hashem et al., 2015; Assuncao et al., 2015). As mining of big data continues to be considered as a source of competitiveness, demand for cloud products such as analytic solutions will continue to be high and a critical factor in the different processes of cloud operations.
Additionally, from the reviewed literature and study findings a critical process of the cloud operations is ensuring that their entities are consuming the cloud products by moving the infrastructure to the cloud and receiving it as a service or to access the different applications including the CRM from the Sales Forces as a service. This can equally provide unique cloud services including the SaaS and the IaaS. In light of the reviewed literature, the identified platforms are instrumental as they offer different enterprises with distinct benefits that range from the information storage, information processing, and development tools (Fouquet et al., 2009; Bayramusta & Nasir, 2016). This is equally supported by the study findings from the respondents that for the cloud operations to be successful, there ought to be sufficient availability of the appropriate level of availability of data.
In particular, from the interviews, this is captured well by the existing focus on the hybrid model. In the government agencies dealing with sensitive data, their preferences are anchored on private cloud as a consequence of the demand for enhanced security and improved access to their data. In such a phenomenon, the quantitative research findings pointed out that this would lead to the cost more cost efficiently on a public cloud. These represent the factors that characterize the relevance of the different cloud models which are equally captured effectively in the reviewed literature. For instance, Bayramusta and Nasir (2016) considered a hybrid as the most optimal deployment method for critical services that have higher security requirements. Mouratidis et al. (2013) also maintained that it is necessary to also offer public cloud for non-critical data since it is more cost-efficient, scalable and flexible. This would be coupled by the need of the IT providers transitioning to a cloud platform to take into consideration the impact of other international providers and hence adopting an appropriate niche. This is supported by past research by CompTia (2015) who backed up the view by noting that a critical number of end-users have a preference of niche providers informed by the opportunities for co-creation of value process. All these factors must be considered to have successful processes for cloud operations.
4.2.2 Roles and Responsibilities Related to Cloud Operations
This component of the artefact design is based on the existence of different roles of IT managers in the management of cloud services organizational resources in the KUWAIT market and adequacy of measures that had already been integrated into ensuring that the IT managers and service providers ensure their different channels are cloud ready with sufficient resources. In any transition process, there has been a common agreement from literature and quantitative and qualitative research findings that offering a demonstration of the criticality of roles in the cloud operations. The basic roles have been identified as being inclusive of demonstration of the role of cloud products in offering substantial business value, inspiring the users in adopting the provided cloud computing framework, providing a substantial business value, inspiring their organisations to use the cloud operations for leveraging on competitive advantage and active positioning of their operations to the cloud offers. Further, their roles scope to the need for building awareness of the forms and benefits of the cloud products, gaining information on the client’s demands and creating a positive relationship with the customers. This is inclusive of increasing the opportunities of end-user for accessing high quality and most effective and available cloud services. Nevertheless, this is only possible when there is an improved capacity of managing the organizational resources for cloud services inclusive of the storage, computing applications among other distinct services. This view is supported by Hashem et al. (2015) study that pointed out that the failure of the majority of the cloud operations is the lack of a stable cloud operation management framework that can provide successfully aid the IT managers in managing the associated organizational resources for cloud services. Additionally, Christopher and Peck (2012) pointed out on the need of adopting micro-marketing is a strategy inclusive of the capacity of allowing firms in customization or targeting their diverse offerings in small segments of local markets in equal measures with individual customers by the IT managers. This is also in line with Yoo (2011) who further argued that cloud computing fundamentally differs from the other existing innovation computing processes including the distributed computing which is inclusive of connections of remote computers in a geographical orientation into a single network allowing for a successful combination of successful processing power.
4.2.3 KPIs for Measuring the Success of Implementations
From the analysis, it is evident that the organisations are tasked with the roles of selecting the functions that need to be migrated to the cloud and the one retained in their premises. The respondents noted that the critical issue includes the costs of their operationalization, security issues and compliance requirements of the organisation operations, timing/speed to market and the estimated returns on investment as the most critical issues. For instance, in the questionnaire findings, the respondents agreed on the issues of appropriate service strategy, deployment model cost-effective and integration of successful digitalized business as an aspect of return on investments. These findings are highly consistent with previous research. Audin (2015) for example found that the transition is likely to shake up the resellers’ old revenue models. Similarly, Morin et al. (2012) predicted that traditional managed services would be affected and hence the loss of revenue in the short term.
By the identified description of Artefact design, figure 3 below illustrates the artefact design
Figure 3: Artefact Design
Figure 5: Artefact Design
Table 1: Artefact Design Description
| Artefact Design Component | Literature Support | |
| Processes for Cloud Operation | Transition of infrastructure to cloud and receiving it as a service | Saya et al. (2010), Hashem et al. (2015), Bayramusta & Nasir (2016) |
| Management | Zhang et al. (2014), Christopher and Peck (2012) | |
| Delivery of Cloud Services | Tordsson et al. (2012), Subramanian et al. (2015) | |
| Enhanced security and improved access to data | Mouratidis et al. (2013), Bayramusta & Nasir (2016), | |
| KPIs to measure the Success of Implementations | Estimated returns on investment | Misra & Mondal (2011) |
| Compliance requirements | Bayramusta & Nasir (2016), Shein et al. (2015) | |
| Security Issues | Kavitha (2011), Oliveira & Martins, (2010) | |
| Cost of operationalization | Armbust et al. (2010); Truong (2010) | |
| Roles and responsibilities related to Cloud operations | Demonstrating roles of cloud products for provision of substantial business value | Troung (2010), Saya et al. (2010) |
| Inspiring the users in adopting the provided cloud computing framework | Assunçao et al., (2015), Kambatla et al. (2014) | |
| Substantial business value provision | Zhang et al., (2014) | |
| Leverage on competitive advantage | Hashem et al., (2015), Assunçao et al., (2015) | |
| Positioning of operations to cloud offers | Lin and Chen (2012) |