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This planning may be done in multiple workshops where "best practices" for
the parties involved, as well as the plan itself, are refined iteratively. After
the workshops, the overall plan must be communicated to all participants.
Once the plan has reached a final version, the migration tests must be
decided upon. Questions to be addressed are:
How much testing is needed, and to how many systems? How much
data needs to be tested?
Will a full migration cycle be tested (including test operations)?
What criteria will lead to a GO decision?
Will the NO‐GO scenario (restore initial state) be rehearsed?
The end result is a migration plan and a plan for the test and real migration
procedures.
Performing the migration
Each migration is unique, therefore at this point only general principles for
the implementation of the migration can be described. These have been
collected from the experience of many migration projects. The most
important points for migrations to Cloud services are:
Include a buffer in the migration plan and use this during the
migration.
Follow your plan and do not compromise. The plan has been created
for just this reason!
In planning, experts tend to be too optimistic in their estimates of
the time needed. Do not panic if the actual processes take longer.
If you have defined a "point‐of‐decision" for the GO / NO‐GO verdict,
then you should also make the decision at this point (any time buffer
should therefore be prior to this point).
Make use of the experience of your Cloud provider, they are not
doing this for the first time. But also trust your internal IT
department. The truth usually lies somewhere in the middle of
conflicting statements.
Despite all preparation and communication, you can expect a little chaos for
the first day of operation. In particular, reinforcement for the support team
