Expect To Save Millions In The Cloud? Prove It

Grazed from InformationWeek. Author: John Foley.

The General Service Administration, in justifying its decision two years ago to adopt Google’s cloud services for email and collaboration, projected it would save $15 million over five years. Now, an internal audit has found that evidence of those anticipated savings is lacking.

GSA’s inspector general recently released the results of its audit of the agency’s transition from Lotus Notes to Google Apps for 17,000 employees. Unisys is the lead contractor on that part of the project. In a related move, GSA awarded a five-year contract to Salesforce.com to use its Force.com service to support the Notes migration. GSA’s undertaking is significant because it’s one of Uncle Sam’s first big steps into the cloud. The agency became the first "to move its entire staff to a single cloud-based email system," according to the inspector general…

The audit, conducted from May to August, reached three findings: Some of GSA’s projected cost savings couldn’t be verified. Performance measures were unclear or otherwise lacking. And GSA hadn’t done an inventory of the applications being moved to the cloud. As a result, the inspector general was "unable to verify whether adequate progress is being made toward the projected savings goals."…

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