From Assessment to Action: Turning Findings into a Roadmap

The Most Common Trap: Assessment Without Consequence

The most frequent problem after a Cloud Readiness Assessment is not missing insight — it is missing decision. Assessment teams deliver extensive documentation: maturity scores, application lists, TCO tables, compliance gaps. But what then?

Typical blockages after an assessment:

• Prioritisation trap: Too many findings, unclear where to start. All measures appear equally important.
• Resource question: Who does the migration — internal teams or external partners? With what budget?
• Decision vacuum: Assessment results reach IT, but budget decisions require C-level sign-off that is never formally obtained.
• Perfectionism: "We'll wait until we've analysed everything completely" — and the migration never starts.

Storm Reply addresses these blockages by planning assessment and roadmap as one integrated process — not two separate projects.

Step 1: Categorise and Prioritise Findings

Before findings can be translated into a roadmap, they must be categorised and prioritised. Storm Reply uses a two-dimensional prioritisation matrix:

Prioritisation within each category uses two criteria: Business Impact (how large is the benefit — cost savings, risk reduction, business enablement?) and Implementation Effort (how high is the effort — complexity, dependencies, resource requirements?). High impact at low effort comes first.

Step 2: Define Migration Waves

A migration roadmap organises applications into migration waves — sequential groups migrated together. Wave planning is the core of the migration plan and determines risk profile, learning curve, and resource deployment.

Principles of Wave Planning

1. Wave 1 — Pilots and Quick Wins: Non-critical applications with Rehost strategy. Goal is experience building, toolchain validation, and first demonstrable results. Typical: 5–15 applications, non-production-critical workloads.
2. Wave 2 — Core Migration: Business-critical applications with Rehost or Replatform. More complex dependency chains, higher testing requirements, rollback scenarios required. Typical: 20–50 applications.
3. Wave 3 — Optimisation and Modernisation: Replatform and Refactor of remaining applications. Use of AWS-native services, cost optimisation through Reserved Instances, container migration. In parallel: decommissioning of Retire candidates.
4. Continuous Wave — Retain Review: Applications classified as Retain in the assessment are regularly re-evaluated. New AWS services or changed business requirements may revise Retain decisions.

Dependency Management

The most common cause of migration delays is unidentified dependencies between applications. Storm Reply uses the AWS Application Discovery Service to automatically create dependency maps — and uses this map as the basis for wave planning. Applications with shared dependencies are migrated in the same wave, or the dependency is resolved before migration.

Step 3: Finalise the Business Case

A roadmap without a business case is a wish list. A business case without a roadmap is a spreadsheet. Together they form the basis for C-level approval and the MAP application.

Components of the Final Business Case

Three-year TCO Projection

Detailed comparison of current total on-premises costs (hardware, software, headcount, energy, floor space, risk) versus projected cloud costs (compute, storage, network, managed services, external migration costs). Created with the AWS Migration Evaluator, validated by Storm Reply's experience values from comparable projects.

Migration Costs per Wave

Effort estimate per migration wave in person-days (internal and external), AWS service costs (Professional Services, training), licence costs (Windows Server, SQL Server — Bring-Your-Own-Licence vs. Licence Included), and testing/validation costs.

Break-even Analysis

From when does the migration pay back? Typically after 12–24 months for pure Rehost projects, 18–36 months for Replatform projects. The graph showing monthly cumulative cost curve is the central executive communication tool.

Risk Assessment

Quantified risk of the status quo: cost of a data centre outage, probability of security incidents on unpatched on-premises systems, risk from end-of-support systems (Windows Server 2012, SQL Server 2012, etc.).

Step 4: Prepare the MAP Funding Application

For eligible workloads, Storm Reply as AWS Premier Consulting Partner can apply for AWS MAP funding. The MAP application is prepared in parallel with roadmap development so that assessment results can be used directly as evidence.

MAP Eligibility Criteria Overview

1. Workload size: MAP is eligible for workloads above a certain AWS usage volume. Storm Reply checks eligibility in the assessment.
2. Partner eligibility: Only certified AWS Migration Competency Partners can submit MAP applications. Storm Reply holds the AWS Migration Competency.
3. Assessment evidence: MAP applications require documented assessment results — exactly what Storm Reply delivers in the Cloud Readiness Assessment.
4. Commitment: The client commits to operating migrated workloads on AWS. This is not an additional hurdle — it is the natural outcome of a successful migration.

MAP Assess phase funding substantially reduces assessment and planning costs. Mobilize phase funding finances landing zone, governance setup, and pilot migrations. Migrate phase funding supports the actual migration of qualifying workloads.

Step 5: Executive Readout and Decision

The conclusion of the assessment-to-roadmap process is the Executive Readout session — a structured presentation for decision-makers (CTO, CIO, CFO, CEO) in which findings, recommendations, and business case are presented and a decision is facilitated.

Structure of an Effective Executive Readout Session

1. Executive Summary (5 minutes): Where you stand today, what we recommend, what it costs, what it delivers. One slide.
2. Maturity Profile (10 minutes): Radar chart with current maturity per dimension, industry comparison, critical gaps.
3. Application Portfolio (10 minutes): Distribution by 7R, top recommendations, Retire potential, migration strategy per group.
4. Roadmap and Wave Plan (15 minutes): Migration waves on a timeline, milestones, critical dependencies, resource requirements.
5. Business Case (10 minutes): TCO comparison, break-even, MAP funding, total investment and return.
6. Next Steps and Decision (10 minutes): What do we need now — go decision for Phase 1, budget approval, MAP application preparation.

The goal of the Executive Readout session is not information — it is decision. Storm Reply prepares all presentation materials and facilitates the session upon request.

Typical Timeline: From Engagement to Approved Roadmap

1. Weeks 1–2: Kick-off, discovery setup, automated infrastructure capture (AWS Application Discovery Service), first interviews with application owners.
2. Weeks 2–4: Application Portfolio Analysis, 7R classification, TCO analysis with AWS Migration Evaluator, compliance review.
3. Weeks 4–5: Roadmap development, wave planning, business case finalisation, MAP application documents.
4. Weeks 5–6: Internal alignment at Storm Reply, quality review, Executive Readout preparation.
5. Week 6: Executive Readout session, decision, next steps.

For standard assessments (20–100 applications), the transition from assessment to approved roadmap is achievable in 6 weeks. Enterprise assessments require 8–12 weeks.

What Comes After the Approved Roadmap?

The approved roadmap is the starting signal for the Mobilize Phase — the technical and organisational preparation for the actual migration:

Landing Zone and Account Strategy

AWS Control Tower establishes a secure, compliant AWS environment with multi-account structure, central logging, security baselines, and governance guardrails. This is the foundation for all subsequent migration steps.

Identity and Access Management

AWS IAM Identity Center (formerly SSO) integrates existing identity providers (Active Directory, Azure AD) into the AWS environment. Role concepts and access matrix are defined and deployed automatically.

Pilot Migrations (Wave 1)

The first 5–15 applications from Wave 1 are migrated — as a learning project, toolchain validation, and proof of migration capability. Results feed directly into Wave 2 planning.

Team Enablement

Training and AWS certifications for internal teams, built around the specific roles and technologies of the roadmap. Storm Reply as AWS Training Partner supports this process.