Overview

“A Cloud Centre of Expertise embodies the cloud expertise needed to bridge the gap hindering digital transformation”

A Cloud Centre of Expertise can be considered  the heart of where cloud competences are built and transferred to the rest of the organisation. ​

The strategic positioning of the CCoE within the organisation is paramount to its effectiveness. It should avoid adopting practices that label IT departments as ‘the department of NO’ and resist falling into ‘ad hoc-ism’ driven by the urgent need to maintain daily operations. The primary goal of the CCoE is to facilitate the transition to the cloud by eliminating obstacles and gaps rooted in outdated processes, infrastructure, applications, human behaviour, and operating models.​

CCoE formation and positioning focuses on the implementation of the CCoE:  the formulation of tasks, identifying its direct counterparts and other stakeholders, defining the way of working, specifying responsibilities and concurring roles and activities. The crux is finding the right people to take place in the CCoE, with sufficient ‘cloud love’, cloud competences and willingness to learn. They will become the organisation’s first cloud ambassadors and will form the go-to team for any question that relates to cloud. Although the CCoE may initially cover adjacent expertise areas such as agility or data-driven practices, the consideration of establishing dedicated expertise centres should arise in due course.​

While the CCoE is starting up, it is important that it is recognised by the rest of the organisation. For this purpose, the added value of the CCoE should be widely communicated and supported. This process will continue until the CCoE is fully embedded in the organisation or when all competences are transferred to other teams and the CCoE is no longer needed. Either way, the organisation will have become sufficiently cloud mature.  One way to assess cloud maturity is by carrying out a cloud maturity scan. Increased cloud maturity of the organisation proves the CCoE to be effective.

Activities checklist

Initial:

• Drafting Blueprint CCoE (tasks, roles,etc)​
• Defining exact scope CCoE​
• Setting up processes to facilitate cloud related questions and knowledge building  ​
• Aligning CCoE tasks with tasks surrounding teams​
• Setting up RASCI per role​
• Defining mission and objectives​
• Assuring CCoE Mandate and Authority​
• Determining Virtual vs Dedicated CCoE, permanent vs Temporary, etc.​
• Defining/implementing a consistent Way of Working​
• Align with other CoE such as Agile, Data etc. to create a common goal; or advice to start them regarding the objective of transformation

Recurring:

• Optimising processes and visibility of the CCoE to remain the go-to team  for cloud related questions​
• Reviewing required staffing of CCoE and adapt to changes in demand​
• Re- assessing CCoE setup and positioning​
• Re-assessing the need to establish other centres of expertise, such as an agile centre of expertise​
• Meet with other CoE for alignment

RASCI