Marriott's Journey to Cloud-powered Transformation

Key Takeaways

1. Drivers for Marriott's Cloud Migration and Modernization:

   • Improve guest experience and enable agility/innovation
   • Move away from data center constraints and leverage cloud capabilities
   • Achieve cost savings, productivity gains, and operational excellence

2. Challenges and Overcoming Resistance to Change:

   • Fear of the unknown and resistance to change within the organization
   • Underestimating the complexity of certain migrations (e.g., to EKS)
   • Competing priorities and the need to balance transformation efforts

3. Measures for Migration Success:

   • Focused on speed and velocity of migration as the key metric
   • Tracked the number of VMs migrated from data centers to the cloud
   • Used the migration progress to drive organizational learning and adoption

4. Building a Modern Cloud Platform:

   • Moved from an infrastructure team to a platform team mindset
   • Incorporated standardized security, observability, and FinOps capabilities
   • Enabled rapid self-service provisioning for application teams

5. Cultural Changes and Embracing FinOps with AI/ML:

   • Addressed fear of the unknown around AI/ML through experimentation and proof of value
   • Established strong leadership support and monthly reporting on FinOps and cost optimization
   • Automated approval processes and built guardrails to enable self-service while controlling costs

6. Next Steps and Future Capabilities:

   • Investing in AIOps and self-healing systems to improve reliability and reduce incidents
   • Exploring predictive analytics, energy-efficient technologies, and sustainability initiatives

Marriott's Transformation Journey

Drivers for Cloud Migration and Modernization

• Marriott's primary drivers for the cloud migration and modernization journey were to transform the guest experience, enable agility and innovation, and move away from the constraints of on-premises data centers.
• The goal was to take the technology and customer experiences closer to the global customer base, which was not easily achievable in a data center environment.
• Marriott also wanted to focus on its core hospitality business rather than managing data centers, aligning with the principle of "build for differentiation, buy for commodity."

Challenges and Overcoming Resistance to Change

• Marriott faced resistance to change and fear of the unknown within the organization, which required a proactive approach to driving the transformation.
• The complexity of certain migrations, such as the move to EKS, was underestimated, leading to the need to balance competing priorities and work closely with application teams.
• Marriott had to learn and adapt along the way, using a "swim or sink" approach to push the organization forward and enable rapid learning.

Measures for Migration Success

• Marriott's primary metric for migration success was the speed and velocity of the migration process, tracking the number of VMs moved from data centers to the cloud.
• This focus on speed allowed the organization to learn and adapt quickly, driving broader adoption and transformation.

Building a Modern Cloud Platform

• Marriott transitioned from an infrastructure team to a platform team mindset, incorporating standardized security, observability, and FinOps capabilities into the cloud platforms.
• This enabled rapid self-service provisioning for application teams, reducing the time to market for new products and features.

Cultural Changes and Embracing FinOps with AI/ML

• Marriott addressed the fear of the unknown around AI/ML through experimentation, proof of value, and strong leadership support.
• The organization established a FinOps practice that partnered closely with finance, using AI/ML to optimize costs and shift from cost savings to cost avoidance.
• Marriott automated approval processes and built guardrails to enable self-service while maintaining control over costs.

Next Steps and Future Capabilities

• Marriott is investing in AIOps and self-healing systems to improve reliability and reduce incidents, leveraging the stability of the cloud platforms.
• The organization is also exploring predictive analytics, energy-efficient technologies, and sustainability initiatives as part of its ongoing transformation journey.

AWS Migration Journey

• AWS offers the Migration Hub Journey, a prescriptive template to guide customers through the migration and modernization process.
• The Migration Hub Journey covers three phases: Assess, Mobilize, and Migrate/Modernize, helping customers make informed decisions, validate their approach, and execute at scale.
• The service provides pre-built templates for various use cases, such as data center exit, mainframe modernization, and database modernization, and allows customers to create their own custom journeys.
• Customers can explore the Migration Hub Journey offerings without the need for an AWS account or credit card, starting with an email address.