When done right, a migration to Office 365 or another cloud solution should be like any other migration. There’s planning that needs to be done, prerequisites that should be determined and the inevitable “quirks” that need to be ironed out once you make the move.
Every company has its own unique environment, so it’s practically impossible to try and plan for every potential pitfall; however, here are some BIG things you want to ask your IT consultant about BEFORE making the leap.
Downtime. Some organizations cannot afford ANY downtime, while others can do without their network for a day or two. Make sure you communicate YOUR specific needs regarding downtime and make sure your IT provider has a solid plan to prevent extended downtime.
Painfully Slow Performance. Ask your IT consultant if there’s any way you can run your network in a test environment before making the full migration. Imagine how frustrated you would be if you migrate your network and discover everything is running so slow you can barely work! Again, every environment is slightly different, so it’s best to test before you transition.
3rd-Party Applications. If your organization has plug-ins to Exchange for faxing, voice mail or integration into another application, make sure you test to see if it will still work in the new environment.
Surprises. Unplanned Events. Ask your IT consultant how they have been surprised. There are typically occurrences of issues that they would consider small items which might impact your organization. If they do not have any stories here than something might be amiss.