Cloud adoption has been rising year by year for some time now, with Gartner predicting this trend to accelerate beyond 2020. It has long moved on from its earliest days, where it was largely regarded as an intriguing concept but unsuitable for enterprise-level applications. Now, with a wide range of options available - including Public, Private and Hybrid solutions - it has become a highly attractive prospect for organisations at all levels, especially against the backdrop of COVID-19 and the resulting advancement of remote working. While these trends are very much the latest stage in a long process of transformation, the pandemic has undoubtedly been the catalyst behind much recent Cloud adoption, as organisations accelerate their journeys towards a distributed workforce. 

So, where does that leave us in terms of the biggest question: "Is Cloud right for my organisation?"

The current global stay at home policy has fundamentally changed how we all work. Many around the world have become accustomed to the daily use of teleconferencing tools, instant messaging platforms and shared documents hosted in the Cloud.

There's no doubt that the current economic environment has led to feelings of instability, in both our personal and professional lives. Consumers are feeling the pinch, and with rising inflation and interest rates, they will have no choice but to curtail their spending. The impact on business is similarly far-reaching. Aside from the economic impact of the reduction in spending, there is the very real situation that both employees and customers will be experiencing stress in their personal lives. As a result, many organisations across the public and private sectors are evaluating how to best maintain their service quality under these difficult circumstances. 

Attracting top talent is just part of the picture when it comes to building a thriving, successful organisation. If employees are to achieve their full potential in both their professional and personal lives, it is essential to nurture their talents and cultivate the skills that will help them progress along their chosen career paths. 

We're all trying to do more with less, whether that's making our monthly shop go further and reducing our utilities consumption at home or doing more with our organisations' available budgets and resources in our professional lives. But while getting the most out of the resources we have available is certainly admirable and sensible, our most precious resource – one that we cannot replenish once it's been used – is all-too-frequently neglected: our time.