This is when I would push back on Azure.

Are you treating Azure for all workloads as the default destination without running the assessment to justify that assumption?

I have migrated more than 100 servers to Azure, and I’ve helped design migration plans that are tied to $2 billion of divestiture activity. I will also tell you that Azure may not be the best destination for all workloads. A good migration engineer will say this out loud before the migration is finalized.

This conversation takes place in the assessment. Not the execution.

Virtual-to cloud moves are not as risky as physical-to-cloud transfers. The Azure Migrate Tool has a lot of documentation and is capable, but only if you give it the workload. The tool will successfully move a workload that has latency-sensitive dependencies or access patterns that are unique to the on-premises network topology. However, performance issues will appear in production if the workload is dependent on applications with specific behaviors.

The 30TB migration of file servers in a large divestiture was not a problem with volume. It was a problem with the behavior of the workload. Before the Azure Migrate Tool could be configured, it was necessary to evaluate the data change rate during the transfer period, the application dependency mapping of workloads that depend on the file server for reads, and the latency requirements of the business units who use the data. The tool was developed after the assessment. The decision was made after the assessment.

The Azure Migration Runbook that I designed for this program was valuable because it included assessment criteria and not just execution steps. In the assessment section, honest recommendations were made. The assessment section was where honest recommendations were made.

The confidence of clients who are able to rely on migration engineers that advocate for the best solution, rather than the default solution, is what leads them to be called back for a subsequent program.

What is the pre-migration workload analysis process and who reviews it prior to the execution plan being approved?

#AzureMigration #MigrationEngineer #CloudMigration