Traditionally, businesses that have a budget cycle echoing the calendar year begin their fiscal-year planning in the fall. If you’re beginning to think through now what you want to see happen to your business in 2016, consider creating new efficiencies.
The cloud can bring efficiency not just to your IT strategies, but also to your everyday operations. Here are four reasons why considering the cloud will help you have a better 2016:

1. Forces Strategic Consideration: If you start with a top-down approach to your business plan, you may be able to identify how one solution across several objectives can positively impact efficiencies. Consider the objectives behind that goal: How many would benefit from a centralized location for all information, especially one that’s always backed up, with strong security?  It could be one initiative that addresses objectives for everyone from marketing to IT and HR.
    
2. Urges External Perspectives: It’s likely that the world of cloud computing and infrastructure-as-a-service is not the native language of your executive team – possibly not even that of your IT director. This is your opportunity to garner third-party expertise for your business. Find a consultant who has:
   
             1. Experienced different systems;
             2. Worked with companies your size;
             3. Utilized your industry-standard applications; and
             4. Has an understanding of alternatives for business-focused solutions.
    
3. Provides Better Access to Your Data: When you apply hosted desktop applications, all of your company’s data can be accessible from any device, at any time. No matter how you log in, on a Mac or a PC, a desktop in a Sheraton lobby or a tablet at the beach, your desktop will always look the same and work the same.  You’ll access all the same information you can when connected at the office, which means you can get a great idea and act on it at any time.
    
4. Provides Financial Efficiencies: One aspect of moving to the Cloud is desktop virtualization. While it may not directly save you money (as in, it may cost the same as your current solution), desktop virtualization does provide a strong platform upon which a company can grow.  It can provide a per-user IT budget, the ability to scale up (and down), centralization and better communications. Through server virtualization, companies can consolidate their server population on average by 25 percent.  If your servers are due for end-of-life assessment, or your users are struggling with disjointed systems or simply expansion, don’t replace. Take it to the cloud, where administration is easier and upgrades are instant.