Then when it comes to being multi-cloud from the start, Yemini advises to "set up a test environment that has cross-cloud connectivity. This could be as simple as vCenter and AWS or more complex with multiple private and public connections," he writes.
Don't bet the farm
It has become something of a given that moving to the cloud will make everything better, but some workloads are simply better left alone.
"In some cases, it doesn't make sense for an organisation to move everything to the cloud and a hybrid approach is best. Build a data-driven cloud strategy based on your applications, your data and your requirements," says Mor Cohen from Turbonomic.
"When you decide which workloads are best-suited for the cloud, don't simply lift and shift everything without understanding how to optimise it. That's like de-cluttering your garage, but instead of throwing out the old and unused items, writing a check every month to keep them in a storage unit across town.
"One of our customers did this and migrated 400 VMs to the cloud. As a result they ended up paying about $4 million per year for those applications – 6X what the cost of the equivalent applications was on prem," she said.
Shift to archival storage where possible
One quick win when it comes to reducing cloud storage costs is to shift older data to cheaper storage tiers. AWS offers a service called Glacier for just this at just $0.0045 per GB per month. Google Cloud's Coldline is a viable alternative to AWS too, at $0.7 per GB per month for data at rest.
Conclusion
All in all the answer to effective cloud management is not a simple one. It requires astute management, solid policies, the right tooling and perhaps even a dedicated team, but as the world moves more and more towards the cloud best practices will emerge.