Why Cloud Migrations Fail
Cloud migrations fail more often than they should — not because the technology is difficult, but because the planning was insufficient. After working on dozens of cloud migrations, the same categories of problems appear repeatedly.
Here are the most common pitfalls, and how to avoid each one.
Pitfall 1: Lift-and-Shift Without Rightsizing
The mistake: Organizations take their on-premise servers — sized for peak load, physical redundancy, and years of accumulated growth — and move them to cloud VMs of the same specification.
The result: Cloud bills that are significantly higher than on-premise costs, undermining the business case.
The fix: Before migration, audit actual resource utilization. Most servers run at 15–30% CPU utilization most of the time. Use cloud-native tools (Azure Monitor, AWS CloudWatch) to right-size based on actual usage, not provisioned capacity.
Pitfall 2: Ignoring Network Latency
The mistake: Applications that were designed to communicate on a local network (sub-1ms latency) are moved to the cloud — but the database or file server stays on-premise. Suddenly every database query travels across an internet connection.
The result: Applications become noticeably slow. Users complain. IT scrambles.
The fix: Map all application dependencies before migrating anything. Applications and their data layers must move together. If that’s not possible in the first phase, plan for a hybrid phase with an ExpressRoute or dedicated connection.
Pitfall 3: Treating Cloud as a Destination, Not an Operating Model
The mistake: Migration is treated as a one-time project with a “done” state. Once the VMs are in Azure, the project is closed.
The result: No governance, no cost management, no security policies. Cloud environments drift into expensive, insecure sprawl.
The fix: Treat the cloud migration as the beginning of a cloud operating model, not the end. Before go-live, define:
- Cost budgets and alerts
- Tagging strategy for cost allocation
- Backup and disaster recovery processes
- Patch management and monitoring
Pitfall 4: Underestimating Identity Complexity
The mistake: The team migrates workloads but doesn’t plan the identity layer. Users authenticate to cloud resources using on-premise credentials via VPN, or — worse — new separate cloud accounts are created for cloud-hosted services.
The result: Users manage two sets of credentials. Security posture fragments. Password reset tickets multiply.
The fix: Design the identity strategy first. For Microsoft environments, Azure AD Connect with seamless SSO is the standard solution. For AWS or GCP, SAML federation with your existing identity provider works well.
Pitfall 5: No Rollback Plan
The mistake: The cutover is planned but the rollback is not. “We’ll figure it out if something goes wrong.”
The result: When something does go wrong (and something always does in complex migrations), recovery is slow and chaotic because no one has rehearsed it.
The fix: Define and document the rollback procedure before migration day. Test it in a pre-production environment. Know exactly:
- What triggers the rollback decision
- Who makes that call
- How long the rollback will take
- What state will you be in after rollback
Checklist: Before You Migrate
□ Application dependency map completed
□ Resource utilization data collected (minimum 30 days)
□ Identity/SSO strategy defined
□ Network connectivity validated (latency, bandwidth)
□ Backup strategy for cloud workloads defined
□ Rollback procedure documented and tested
□ Cost budget and alerts configured
□ Security baseline (NSGs, policies) pre-configured
□ Pilot migration completed and validated
□ Go-live communication plan readyCloud migrations are achievable and the benefits are real — but only when the planning matches the ambition of the project.
If you’re planning a cloud migration and want an independent review of your approach, get in touch.