Unpacking the Significance of Well-Architected Reviews
Tuesday 30th January 2024
In 2024, cloud is no longer a new technology on the scene. At this point in the game, we’re all familiar with how powerful the cloud can be – driving revenue, cutting costs, and streamlining internal operations.
Yet, despite 94% of enterprises using the cloud, a much smaller portion of businesses are achieving these benefits. Why? A lack of efficiency. Owning a tool and using it effectively are two very different things and something we experience when reviewing people’s AWS architecture.
With the digital landscape constantly evolving, ensuring that your AWS architecture aligns with best practices and standards is paramount. AWS Well-Architected Reviews (WAR) offers a strategic approach to optimising your cloud infrastructure.
AWS Well-Architected is an overarching framework that helps companies create streamlined, efficient, and high-performing cloud infrastructure. It spans six core pillars, touching on sustainability, security, reliability, and other functions.
Source. – The Six Operational Pillars of the AWS Well-Architected Framework
In this article, we’ll dive into the most common challenges customers face when managing cloud governance and highlight some of the substantial benefits that WAR could bring to their business.
Exploring the Leading Customer Challenges with Cloud Infrastructure
The cloud is a dynamic tool that offers businesses unparalleled scalability. Yet, without effective management strategies in place, it can be hard to really find the true value of cloud architecture.
Businesses routinely run into the same problems when using cloud infrastructure. Commonly, we’re seeing cloud spending, security, expertise, governance, and compliance problems.
However, more surprising is the percentage of companies that report these problems, with most organisations running into the same issues time and time again.
Let’s break down some of these problems.
Source: Flexera’s State of Cloud Survey – Leading Cloud Challenges in All Organisations
Cloud Security Concerns
Security is a huge concern for any organisation. Whether we’re talking about small compliance issues or large-scale breaches, everything falls into the security category. Organisations often grapple with security challenges in their AWS architecture, leading to vulnerabilities.
Especially for security experts who have been working in the industry for many years, the cloud presented a whole new frontier when it began to become popular. With any form of novelty comes a steep learning curve.
The intricate nature of cloud infrastructure has led to knowledge gaps, creating vulnerabilities which some companies may not realise they have. Businesses must understand what security measures they must take and how to effectively implement them when constructing a robust attack surface.
Cloud Infrastructure Optimisation Challenges
Maintaining optimal performance and resource utilisation while adhering to the Well-Architected Framework can be complex, hindering efficiency. Evolving business requirements can add dynamic layers to the framework, which further complicate cloud management, resource planning, and optimisation.
When infrastructure management isn’t completely transparent, things can fall through the cracks. Complexities that your business doesn’t simplify – whether in analysis, resource usage, or cloud monitoring – can lead to overspending or performance issues.
Addressing cloud infrastructure challenges requires extensive planning, a comprehensive understanding of available architecture, and continuous adjustment.
Cloud Reliability and Performance Challenges:
Performance. Performance. Performance. Without a streamlined system that offers a streamlined level of operation for your business, your environment could be costing you more than it's worth.
Ensuring a reliable and resilient cloud environment poses challenges as businesses seek to minimise downtime and maximise availability. Especially as businesses scale, the additional factors of multiple geographic regions, more diverse workloads, and concurrent use cases can add layers of challenge to the mix.
When functioning perfectly, cloud systems can offer unparalleled reliability. But, with over 50% of cloud migrations failing, companies need to do the groundwork before getting to this stage.
Exploring Cloud Management Solutions: Using AWS Well-Architected Reviews
AWS Well-Architected Reviews offers a holistic approach to elevate your cloud infrastructure.
These reviews encompass comprehensive security assessments, offering actionable insights and recommendations to fortify the overall security posture. They also analyse existing architecture against best practices to help your organisation identify opportunities for efficient resource optimisation, cost savings, and improved performance.
Guiding businesses in implementing resilient architectures, Well-Architected Reviews minimise single points of failure, ensuring consistent reliability and enhancing the overall robustness of your cloud environment.
Using AWS WAR can offer various benefits to your business:
- Enhanced Security Posture: Rigorous security evaluations lead to a strengthened defence against potential threats, ensuring data integrity and compliance with industry standards.
- Optimised Infrastructure Costs: Implementing recommendations from Well-Architected Reviews results in cost savings, efficient resource utilisation, and a streamlined architecture aligned with business needs.
- Improved Reliability: Businesses can achieve higher levels of reliability, reduced downtime, and improved overall performance by aligning their AWS infrastructure with the Well-Architected Framework.
In this blog we have discussed some of the key challenges when it comes to cloud governance and how Well-Architected Reviews are essential in helping to optimise architectures, mitigate risks, manage costs, improve performance, and ensure compliance with regulatory requirements. By conducting regular reviews and implementing recommendations, businesses can maximise the benefits of AWS cloud services while minimising risks and costs.
Navigating the AWS cloud landscape with Well-Architected Reviews empowers organisations to address security concerns, optimise infrastructure, and enhance reliability.
So, what are the next steps for a Bytes WAR?
Bytes is a certified AWS Well-Architected Partner. This means our review process is based on the Well-Architected Framework and takes into account each of its six core pillars.
You can trust our cloud architects to use only best practice methods to streamline your business operations and enhance your company’s usage of the cloud. From mitigating costly errors that might occur when using an uncertified partner to freeing up your time from carrying out the work yourself, Byes offers an all-in-one service that you can rely on.
Interested? Read more or contact a member of the team [email protected] to set up a call!
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