11 The Cautious Strategists Cautious Strategists display the characteristics of the strategic cloud adoption phase (see characteristics on page 15 here). In this phase, firms shift their focus beyond immediate cost benefits to starting to change the way their teams develop and operate software solutions. This may include some degree of change to their teams, their applications and software tools, and their operating models. Tactical Strategic Transformational Learn Self-taught, 3rd-party Organized training, Peer learning and sharing, reliance 3rd-party assisted 3rd-party staff aug. only Lead Teams by function, New cross-functional Cross-functional feature heroic project manager cloud team teams, greater autonomy Change is slow and Templates ensure good All change is constant, low Scale risky, ops heavy governance without manual risk and quickly fixed review Secure Fear of public internet, but Central identity, hybrid Trust only the right people, trust in private network network devices, and services Figure 4. The Cautious Strategists in the Cloud Adoption Framework These firms have already shifted key assets to the cloud and are now expanding their initial investments to pursue new customers and markets. Having advanced beyond the tactical cost optimization phase of moving discrete workloads into the cloud, they begin to embrace the broader vision: harnessing the public cloud to streamline operations, increase value across the enterprise, and transform their organizations to expand revenue growth in key areas. For instance, instead of building a data center in every country, forward-thinking capital markets firms can partner with a cloud provider to set-up operations and service clients in new geographic regions, rapidly and at little cost. This translates into greater speed-to-market and a lower total cost of ownership (TCO) for operations in those locations, with cloud vendors serving as key partners in their business development playbooks.