Leidos’ Lakshmi Ashok on monitoring the performance of high-level, edge services
Lakshmi Ashok, vice president of Enterprise Management Services at Leidos, spoke with Federal News Network's Tom Temin about security, data management, and the most critical factors to consider for cloud deployments. They also discussed trends and best practices for cloud-based enterprise IT solutions, including in the areas of security, data management, and interconnectivity.
Ashok cited rapid processing of passport applications, number-crunching to identify viruses, and streaming live drone data for disaster assessment as examples of capabilities made possible by IT in the cloud. She said successful cloud IT deployments such as these start with consideration of the user experience, followed by three other critical factors:
Customer experience
“Today, it's all about the customer experience," Ashok said of cloud solutions. Whether for a citizen applying for a passport or a border patrol agent identifying a bad actor, cloud services must work as expected, where and when needed. Ashok puts customer service first as a metric for organizations to measure in cloud-based enterprise IT.
Speed
“Second is speed," Ashok said. “Speed to getting these applications developed and deployed." Accelerating application development and deployment takes on new significance in an era of rapidly changing policies due to increased data protection concerns, according to Ashok. “How do you make sure that the applications directly reflect the policy changes as quickly as possible?"
Security
“Gone are the old days where we had our data centers and perimeters to secure, and everything in the data center would be safe," Ashok said. “Now, we've got to rethink security." That means approaching IT modernization with a zero-trust mindset. “At Leidos, we are doing a lot of solutioning around zero trust, especially as it comes to cloud."
Cost
“Thinking about cloud as just another data center and lifting and shifting applications to cloud is not going to pay off," Ashok said. Yes, migrating enterprise IT services to the cloud can deliver cost savings, but only if done carefully considering what applications and data belong there to provide the best customer experience, speed, and security.
Among other factors organizations should consider for cloud deployments, Ashok cited interconnectivity. “Interconnectivity between the clouds is a great way to share services between agencies," she said.
Learn more about Leidos Digital Modernization capabilities
Watch the video playback above and the next in the series: Leidos’ Srini Iyer on gaining data advantage in federal health care
