How We Plan a Cloud Data Migration

 

Proper data migrations involve 4 basic steps:

 

1. Review cloud options and choose the best fit
2. Extract data
3. Transform data
4. Load data

 

Moving important or sensitive data and decommissioning legacy systems can put stakeholders on edge. Having a solid plan is a must; however, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel. You can find numerous sample data migration plans and checklists on the web. 

• Premigration planning. Evaluate the data, the access needs, and the feature best suited to your workforce’s operational needs
• Project initiation. Identify and brief key stakeholders on the timeline
• Landscape analysis. Establish a robust data quality rules management process and brief the business on the goals of the project, including shutting down legacy systems.
• Solution design. Determine what data to move, and the quality of that data before and after the move.
• Build & test. Code the migration logic and test the migration with a mirror of the production environment.

Execute & validate. Demonstrate that the migration has complied with requirements and that the data moved is viable for business use.

Decommission & monitor. Shut down and dispose of old systems.

 

This may appear to be an overwhelming amount of work, but not all these steps are needed for every migration. Each situation is unique, and each company approaches the task differently.