Cloud Shift is a cloud services company that focuses on cyber security, software development, professional services, talent deployment, and business transformation services. We harness the utility and potential of cloud computing and software development to enable companies to modernize their business processes, support their transition to digital platforms and, where required, migrate their businesses to the cloud. Our vision is to turn the frontiers of cloud computing into practical solutions and practices so that every client company can take advantage of the potential of the cloud to increase their business viability. Cloud Shift’s mission is to position and enable its range of clients to achieve their strategic business goals by advising, preparing, and collaborating with them to modernize their business practices through customized business architectures and workflows, sound professional advice, and appropriate cloud-based digital platforms. This mission supports our clients’ readiness to capitalize on the potential of cloud computing and cyber security solutions to generate greater productivity, improve data security, enhance business value, and improve their service delivery to their customers.
Tell us about yourself?
My background is varied, having evolved through careers in international business, senior executive management, international development, IT project management, journalism, and media communications. My professional careers were shaped by my exposure to international cultures and different business scenarios during my 16 years traveling the globe on business across 63 countries and five continents. I got into cloud computing and business transformation largely through my international exposure to diverse technical research collaboration and solutions development with various companies and research organizations in Europe, Africa, South America, and Asia. What was interesting about these different business cultures was the need to solve similar productivity-type problems and process constraints despite their nuances. Also influential were the few years I spent in international development, collaborating with international partners across scientific research and solutions development areas to solve seemingly intractable economic, business, and social problems. Technology has always played a pivotal enabling role in the problem-solving process, and that exposure led me into project management and technical solutions development along a continuum that eventually included cloud computing.
If you could go back in time a year or two, what piece of advice would you give yourself?
I would advise my younger self to be more patient and reflective. These two attributes are crucial to problem-solving as well as to developing sound emotional intelligence. I would also advise myself to have a more rapt understanding of the motivations of others because with better understanding comes greater clarity and illumination that could then foster better decision-making and inclusivity.
What problem does your business solve?
We solve business delivery constraints and a lack of business viability due to inefficient business processes and workflows and insufficient digital modernization. We help companies transform their business’ sustainably so that they can be better positioned to achieve their strategic objectives and goals.
What is the inspiration behind your business?
Have you ever witnessed the relief on a client’s face when a strategic goal has been achieved, or a process has been improved, or a business victory has been secured? Such an instance is both revelatory and beseeching in that it’s like this gigantic exhale brought on by the success of a transformation mission. There is no more powerful inspiration or motivator than a client whom you have helped to realize a particular goal or a set of established objectives, and success is realized. This, together with an exemplary business partner who, seemingly effortlessly, gets the “big picture” whose life philosophy matches mine and who strives towards the same corporate goals that include community goodwill and inclusivity. These two are the elixir that sustain and grow Cloud Shift.
What is your magic sauce?
Our “magic sauce” is a medley of key ingredients that include solutions, creativity, tight client collaboration, business empathy for our clients, diversity of thought, and an indomitable spirit to solve problems. It’s not simply about available technologies. That’s an easy factor. We differ from our competitors through our international experience, which allows us to examine business challenges from different angles and perspectives that support more viable solutions development. In addition, we harness the skills, expertise, and efficiencies of our trusted partners. We also engage in close business collaboration through comparative advantage. This is one of Cloud Shift’s hallmarks, as this kind of collaboration usually produces unique results for our clients.
What is the plan for the next 5 years? What do you want to achieve?
For Cloud Shift, our intent is crystal clear. Scale our business footprint across several continental markets. Become a bellwether for unique business transformation and cloud enablement solutions and technology development, and nurture a cadre of the next generation of cloud computing professionals who do not simply focus on the proverbial “bottom line” but who will think, reflect, and then engage in contributing to the development of unique business and technology platform solutions that could also have a positive and lasting social impact.
What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced so far?
General economic slowdown and a degree of policy shifting by some clients in one particular business vertical. These two factors created our testiest challenges to date as they impinged upon our strategic advisory resources deployments and revenue generation objectives. In addition, they created additional challenges for our advisory services supply chain as our staggered approach to human resources deployments was stalled. However, we pivoted quickly by focusing on our software development and customization advantages, new product investment, solutions development partnerships, scaling out our business-to-business corporate alliances, and related sales push. A key lesson learned is the importance of being business and market-diverse, having a range of core products and services across business verticals, segments, and markets, as well as having strategic partnerships and alliances that can be employed as a buttress against strong economic headwinds.
How can people get involved?
Cloud Shift focuses preponderantly on small-to-medium-sized companies, as well as larger corporations in both the private commercial and government sectors, as well as the non-profit segment. Any company wishing to modernize its business processes, needing customized software solutions, requiring transforming of its business to take advantage of the power of cloud computing, or needing to migrate its workflows to the cloud while requiring highly knowledgeable professional human resources can contact Cloud Shift at: (613) 618-5723 and also visit our website at: www.cloudshift.net.