Less than one in five (18%) IT professionals believe their present cloud infrastructure satisfies their business needs, indicating a large disconnect between expectations and reality when it comes to cloud adoption.

This is according to new data from SolarWinds, based on a survey of 272 global IT professionals, which shows that despite the cloud’s promises of scalability and cost savings, the reality is mixed for many IT teams: only a quarter of those surveyed (25%) feel their organisation’s approach to the cloud is carefully considered and successful, while 23% admit their hybrid cloud strategy has created an overly complex IT environment. Despite this, less than a quarter (22%) of respondents have invested in external IT services to help with cloud migration strategy.

In response to these cloud challenges, more than one in ten (16%) respondents have already repatriated workloads back to on-premises. Meanwhile, a further 12% acknowledge that poorly planned cloud transitions have already resulted in long-term financial impacts on their organisations. This goes to show that rushed cloud migrations can lead to costly fixes or reversals.

The data also indicates a lack of trust in cloud security, with nearly half (46%) of IT pros still storing their most sensitive data on-premises due to persistent security worries. However, the findings do highlight a continued focus on cloud strategies with the aim of reducing costs. In fact, nearly a third (29%) of respondents say they are prioritising cloud migration to cut operational costs.

Sascha Giese, global tech evangelist at SolarWinds, said: “The truth is, managing complex hybrid-cloud ecosystems isn’t easy. While the cloud promises scalability and cost savings, the gap between expectation and execution is becoming increasingly evident. In this landscape, many businesses find themselves grappling with overly complex infrastructures that struggle to meet evolving needs.

“In a hybrid cloud world with increasingly complex networks, systems, devices, and applications, managing microservices and containers adds to the challenge. Without proper planning and comprehensive visibility, organisations risk finding themselves in a dire situation. Tool sprawl, information silos, and alert fatigue can all lead to an unpleasant cloud experience, making it harder to identify the root causes of complex issues.

“To overcome these challenges, IT leaders must adopt a more strategic and informed approach to cloud migration, focusing on tools that are reliable, secure, and accelerate modernisation. One key advantage businesses can leverage to successfully manage their hybrid cloud infrastructures is comprehensive observability. That means gaining real-time visibility into every layer of the IT estate and acting proactively with the assistance of machine learning algorithms and AI-driven analytics. Cloud infrastructure can be a powerful growth enabler, but with a mess of mismatched tools and poor visibility, it will be a bumpy ride.”

The findings of the IT Community Pulse survey are based on research fielded in Sept 2024, which yielded responses from 272 respondents from the SolarWinds THWACK community.

This includes IT professionals across a range of practitioner, manager, and director roles in Europe, the Americas, and Asia Pacific regions. Respondents are from a mix of the public and private sector across small, medium, and large organisations.