Issue link: https://epubs.iltanet.org/i/9825
FACT-BASED COMPARISON OF HOSTED SERVICES: GOOGLE VS. MICROSOFT them with specific steps when migrating to the cloud environment provides architectural guidance and input on preferred practices, architecture, tools and risk analysis to CIOs, architects and senior members of IT teams. A transition design session can also help ensure that different practices use interoperability strategically to meet long-term business goals rather than simply patch together disparate solutions for the short duration of the migration. SELECT VENDORS OBJECTIVELY To arrive at a more competitive comparison, law firms can define a set of requirements and ask vendors to provide the costs and benefits of their hosted solutions. This process allows each vendor to showcase their solutions according to clearly defined firm needs. The decision should not be made on the basis of the initial cost of acquisition but should consider ongoing maintenance costs, benefits accrued due to increased organizational performance and end-user productivity, and the level of security and back-end service guarantees that are offered. START SMALL AND WEIGH THE BENEFITS Investing in cloud computing can lock firms into vendor-controlled data storage. Law firms should first deploy small groups of end users on hosted service solutions and compare the deployment and management experiences, the realized benefits and user feedback. To get started, firms should take advantage of the low- or no-cost trial programs offered by both Google and Microsoft to investigate how they might benefit from each provider’s capabilities. ILTA strategic unity conference.iltanet.org www.iltanet.org Microsoft 39