I had an interesting meeting on Friday with Richard Anning of the ICAEW IT faculty. I had asked for the meeting to clarify some of the points I had raised following the recent ICAEW Cloud Computing Conference. We had a frank and full discussion on our relative views and I am grateful to Richard for his time.
However, one of the points raised was that I was perceived to be a vendor consulting, as I do, for E-conomic. I wanted, therefore, to clarify the position.
One of the many hats that I an wearing nowadays is that of a consultant to E-conomic. My principal role is advising them on entry into the UK Market and speaking to accountants on their behalf. I have the advantage of, not only being involved with The Cloud for over 10 years, but of having extensively used E-conomic in practice and can therefore bring to the table practical advice on using and integrating the product as well as educating clients and fellow partners. When discussing the relative merits of the various solutions on offer, I am happy to make my involvement with E-conomic clear at the outset.
However, when commenting on the Cloud and its benefits, I do so as an independent consultant. I am not promoting any particular application and I am not concerned as to what people end up using… just as long as the positive message gets out.
Another point that was raised during our meeting was a comment I made in my recent blog where I said that there were no negatives in using the Cloud. I still stand by that view and as hard as I try, I can’t come up with any. I do accept, however, that there are many perceived negatives and that for most people, perception is reality. I see it as my role to clarify those perceptions and to explain where the perception and the reality vary.
In future, I will make it clearer which of my many hats I am wearing when I make my comments .
…. so to coin a phrase from the Two Ronnies, I will sign off from me…and from him!
PS. A practical advantage of the Cloud…I started this blog on my Iphone whilst I was waiting to have a haircut this morning and finished it on my desktop computer when I arrived home. No file transfer necessary, it was just there. Clever stuff!
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