In today's business landscape, cloud adoption and deployment is more than just a technical discussion. It's really a choice about how to operate your business, regardless of what industry or vertical your organization is affiliated with.

However, as a former CIO, I understand that many CIOs are more concerned with the challenges they face when moving to the cloud than the benefits they can achieve.

For example, in the past, all of your company information and applications were locked-up behind a firewall. As such, none of your customers or remote employees could gain access to your network. Now, through clouds, you can put your business out in the world -where your customers, employees, partners and more can gain access. It's truly making business more accessible, in an incredibly flexible way -but it can be a daunting process.

Recently, I had the chance to participate in a new Cloud Insights Video Podcast and share how all verticals face similar challenges when it comes to cloud. It probably comes as no surprise that the key areas of concern are security and privacy.

So, how can CIOs address these challenges?  

Go find the right partner.

Security and privacy are very real challenges, and it's the CIOs job to address them, but he/she doesn't have to go at it alone. Businesses should look for a cloud service provider to become a trusted business partner. When a business is looking for a cloud service provider to host its application or data, the main questions that arise are:

• How are we going to ensure security?
• How will I maintain control over the data and applications that I put in the cloud?
• How do I maintain visibility?

When these questions about control and visibility are answered, it inevitably leads to trust. And when a CIO feels there is a level of trust for information and application security within the cloud, it ripples down through the organization, ultimately empowering customer relationships.

It's transformational when a CEO can say to customers,"We do have that level of control and visibility and you can look to us to take care of your information."

As organizations in various verticals look to move past security concerns, CIOs need to find a partner they trust and start a conversation, they may be surprised at how quickly some of their concerns can be mitigated.

VisitCloud Executive Perspectivesto get additional cloud insights for IT leaders and subscribe to the Cisco Cloud Insights video podcast channel on iTunes or via RSS.  Additional Cisco Cloud Insights videos can also be foundhere.

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http://www.slideshare.net/CiscoBusinessInsights/cloud-insights-how-anyone-in-any-vertical-can-get-started-in-cloud

Additional Resources:

• Download this podcast
• View previous podcast episodes
• Subscribe via RSS to the Cloud Insights Series
• Subscribe via iTunes Podcasts to the Cloud Insights Series
• See highlights and key quotes from the podcast

In the same video podcast series:  How Cisco IT Solved Its Internal Cloud Dilemma by Didier Rombaut via#CiscoBlog

Cisco Solutions for Open and Secure Intercloud Workload Migration. Join our webcast to learn how the Cisco InterCloud solution helps ensure the same network security, quality of service (QoS), and access control policies previously enforced in the data center are implemented in the public cloud. The webcast is available on demand.

Watch the Cisco Intercloud Workload Migration Webcast  (available on demand)

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