How Codify Supported a Queensland Government Agency in Remediating Operational Risk and Migrating to Microsoft Azure Cloud
Industry
Government
Justice
Withheld
Queensland, Australia
.NET Application Modernisation
Document Management
Azure Foundation
Background
In 2020, following an assessment by a big-four consultancy that revealed areas of potential risk in its bespoke management system, a Queensland Government justice sector agency approached Codify to support the remediation of the issues that were uncovered and to lead its migration to the cloud.
According to the Manager of Business Systems and Applications within the agency,
“the system is written in Microsoft .NET technology, and while it used reasonably up-to-date supporting and operational systems, the architecture itself was relatively legacy. So while we went through a number of processes internally to reduce the risk in our systems as much as possible, the external review identified issues that could have impacted our ability to support our workforce.”
“One of those issues was around the technology that we were utilising to support our document management facility,” the Manager explains. “The system sees more than 10,000 documents a day coming through. Had a problem occurred, our officers would have been impacted operationally and potentially unable to readily access the information needed to do their jobs.”
Selecting Codify as a Microsoft Azure Partner
To identify a provider that could help resolve these issues, the agency reached out to Microsoft. “As an organisation, we’ve got a great relationship with Microsoft,” explains the Manager.
“So the first thing we did was engage Microsoft and have a conversation with their technical staff around the potential remediation work that needed to take place. They then identified Codify as one of their key partners, and suggested that we engage with Codify to get the best outcome to what we were trying to achieve.”
From the start, both Codify and the agency recognised two aspects to the work: the need to address the risk that had been identified and the need to adhere to Queensland Government Enterprise Architecture guidelines around moving to the cloud.
“Not only were we remediating an application risk within the organisation,” the Manager states, “but this was also our first go at starting to move from on-premises capability to using cloud. We really needed, not just expertise in remediating and selecting the correct capability for us to move to, but also expertise in actually assisting our teams in deploying to the cloud for the first time.”
Mitigating Risk While Preparing for Migration
The agency’s stakeholders worked closely with Ben Parker, a Director at Codify and Josh Hurn, an Infrastructure Consultant at Codify to both identify a solution and to prepare to transition the agency’s system to Microsoft Azure Cloud.
“Ben and Josh had a really thorough understanding of dealing with the complexities of government agencies, and also of the fact that we’d need to pull in several different teams to achieve our objectives. This was really around not just engaging with the applications team. We’re also engaging with the infrastructure team, as it was their first outing on Azure as well. Also, our cyber security team and information management people needed to be involved around the privacy considerations that needed to be accounted for within the solution.”
~ Manager of Business Systems and Applications within the agency
“Codify led us and led our teams in the IT area through the whole process from start-to-finish, including the development of options for what the final solution would be.” Even better, the Manager notes, “All the way through the engagement, they were very focussed around knowledge transfer. Codify actually instigated several formal training sessions where they sat down with teams and trained them in Azure and the complexities of moving to the cloud. They made sure that knowledge around the solution was captured, made available for documentation, and passed on to the teams involved.”
Developing Secure, Cost Optimised Cloud Solutions
Because deploying applications on Microsoft Azure was a new undertaking for the agency, its team members leaned on Codify for guidance on governance best practices and cost optimisation.
“When everything’s on-premises, you’re able to manage all your infrastructure through the life cycles and the renewal cycles. Everything’s very predictable,” describes the Manager. “As you move into that Azure environment, there are things that are very easy to overlook, like costs involved around consumption. It was helpful to have that knowledge and to plan, not just the best solution as far as security and performance, but also from an ongoing cost perspective.”
Speaking to his overall experience partnering with Codify, the Manager states, “After years and years of dealing with consultancies and consultants, I honestly can’t fault Ben and Josh and the team at Codify. They’re fantastic. There’s a lot of skill in our organisation, and a lot of people know their stuff, but really, the engagement was just second-to-none, as far as I’m concerned.”
Codify continues to support the agency as it adapts to its new cloud architecture. “Even since the engagement has ended, they’re always happy to click an email or to take time out to have a conversation,” the Manager concludes. “They’re always happy to come on-site and talk about how to solve problems that aren’t even necessarily related. Because obviously, our journey to Azure has just started. They’re more than happy to assist us in any way they can.”
Cloud computing with Microsoft Azure has never been easier. Contact Codify to discuss your next cloud project.