How to Reduce Engineering Costs

The #1 mistake companies make with IT budgets? Ignoring these hidden costs. Have you ever looked at your IT budget and wondered, "Where is all this money going?" You’re not alone. IT budgets are leaking money—silently, predictably, and worst of all, avoidably. I helped a medical device manufacturing company cut IT costs by 22%—without layoffs, without cutting corners, and without slowing innovation. Here’s how we did it: Step 1: Removing IT Waste 💸 We dug into the numbers and found shocking inefficiencies: 🚀 Eliminated redundant systems (why pay for two tools that do the same thing?) 🚀 Consolidated overlapping applications (less complexity, lower costs) 🚀 Reduced licensing & maintenance fees (goodbye, overpriced contracts) ✅ Result: 22% lower Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). Step 2: Improving Efficiency Once we stopped the money leaks, we focused on making IT work smarter, not harder: 📌 Automated tedious, manual tasks (so teams could focus on real innovation) 📌 Identified bottlenecks & streamlined workflows (less friction, faster execution) 📌 Boosted operational efficiency by 30% 🚀 💡 Faster execution. Lower costs. Better resource allocation. Step 3: Smart Cloud Migration Instead of just "lifting and shifting" to the cloud, we optimized first: 🔹 Right-sized IT infrastructure (no more overpaying for unused capacity) 🔹 Cut legacy maintenance costs (old tech shouldn’t drain new budgets) 🔹 Aligned resources to real business needs (spend smarter, not just more) How You Can Apply This Today ✔ Take a hard look at IT spending—find hidden costs ✔ Automate routine tasks—eliminate unnecessary manual work ✔ Renegotiate vendor contracts—secure better deals 💡 IT should drive growth, not just cost. What’s one way you’ve optimized IT spending? Let’s discuss. P.S. Cutting costs doesn’t mean cutting innovation. If you’re rethinking your IT strategy, I’d love to hear your approach. #DigitalTransformation #CIO #Technology #Innovation

Most leaders try to fix problems by adding more. ➕ More features. ➕ More resources. ➕ More cost. But in complex sales and business growth, adding 'more' often makes problems worse — bloating offers, slowing decisions, and creating friction. The leaders who consistently win work differently. They strip things away first. 🪶 I call it the 'Breakdown–Build-Back (BBB) Model'. A two-step framework I’ve used and taught to transform deals, operations, and go-to-market strategies. 💡 Why It Works Most constraints in business are inherited, not real. - Legacy processes that no one remembers justifying - Feature lists built for 'average' customers rather than a specific one - Assumptions repeated so often they’ve become 'truth' The BBB Model dismantles these false constraints and rebuilds only what drives measurable value. It works because it focuses attention, resources, and alignment on what matters most for the outcome, not the baggage that’s been carried along. 🛠 The Model 1️⃣ Breakdown - Deconstruct the challenge into its smallest components; whether that’s a product, a sales process, or a negotiation package. - Separate the essential from the assumed. - Use data and direct customer input to identify what actually creates value. 2️⃣ Build-Back - Reassemble only the components that deliver impact for this specific deal or market need. - Substitute, simplify, or eliminate low-value elements. - Align stakeholders early so the rebuilt solution is executable. 📌 Real Example I watched a senior exec face a multi-million-unit notebook order with three constraints: - Strict technical specs - Minimal features - A price point close to commodity-level Instead of starting with “how can we cut costs?” they began with 'Breakdown' — mapping every component: display, casing, ports, keyboard, storage, assembly, packaging. Then they moved to 'Build-Back' — cutting unused ports, simplifying casing, streamlining packaging, and preserving core specs. ✅ 20% cost reduction ✅ Price target met ✅ Margins protected ✅ Deal saved 🚀 How BBB Applies to Sales & Growth 1. Solution Design – Craft offers that meet buyer priorities with precision, not excess. 2. Negotiation – Remove low-value elements to meet price points without gutting profitability. 3. Market Entry – Launch lean, focused offers that win early adoption and scale faster. Why it’s powerful: When you stop treating all features, processes, and 'requirements' as sacred, you start to see where speed, simplicity, and cost efficiency live. This creates competitive advantages in margin, agility, and deal velocity. And this is critical for enterprise sales, where complexity kills deals. Did this resonate? If yes, please follow me and repost.

In my last year at AWS, I was once tasked with finding $400 million in cost savings for cloud spending in just one year. It was a daunting challenge, but I learned a lot of valuable lessons along the way that I'd like to share with you. First, let's go over what I did to save that $400 million. Here are the top three strategies that worked for me: - Automation of idle instances: It's common for developers and testers to leave instances running even when they're not being used, which can add up quickly. We built automation to identify idle instances, tagged them, sent emails to people, and shut them down automatically if we didn’t get a response to leave them up. - Elimination of unused backups and storage: We found that we were keeping backups of customer data that we weren't using, which was costing us a lot of money. By reaching out to customers and getting their approval to delete backups that weren't being used, we were able to save a substantial amount of money. - Reserved instances: Reserved instances have a much lower cost than on-demand instances, so we made sure to buy them whenever possible. We also used convertible RIs so that we could shift between instance types if there were mispredictions about which types of instances would be in demand. Now, let's talk about what I would do differently if I were facing this challenge today. Here are two key strategies that I'd focus on: - Start with automation: As I mentioned earlier, automating the identification and shutdown of idle instances is crucial for cost savings. I'd make sure to start with this strategy right away, as it's one of the easiest and most effective ways to save money. - Be cautious with reserved instances: While RIs can be a great way to save money, they're not always the right choice. If you're in a world where you might be shrinking, not growing, you need to be much more cautious about buying RIs. Make sure to consider your commitment to buy and whether you'll be able to sell the capacity later. What would you add to this list? #devops #cloud #automation

4 Ways to Cut IT Costs (Without Derailing Progress) Because budget cuts don’t have to mean broken tools, burnt-out staff, or saying goodbye to innovation. Most cost-cutting plans feel like a panic attack in PowerPoint form. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Here’s how smart IT leaders reduce spend—and increase impact—without setting the place on fire: 1. Find Hidden Cost Traps The biggest leaks aren’t obvious. They’re subtle, routine, and quietly expensive. Too Many Tools ↳ Map all tools to their actual job. If three platforms are all "collaboration tools," it's time to consolidate. Manual Workloads ↳ Automate anything repetitive. Approvals, resets, new user setups—if it happens more than twice a week, it's costing too much. Untracked Assets ↳ Use dashboards to track usage, not just possession. If it’s unused, it’s wasting money. Always Reactive ↳ Stop solving the same fire twice. Every incident should include a review. Fix the root, not just the result. Shadow IT ↳ Rogue tools happen when people don't trust the process. Bring them in, don’t crack down. 2. Make Smart IT Moves Cutting costs doesn’t mean cutting capability. Platform Consolidation ↳ Run fewer systems, better. Centralize requests, assets, and approvals on one scalable ITSM platform. Automation First ↳ Identify 3 tasks your team dreads. Automate those first. That’s ROI with receipts. Asset Visibility ↳ Track what you have, who’s using it, and when it renews. Surprise renewals = surprise budget crises. Shift Left ↳ Move common fixes down the stack. Help frontline teams solve problems faster and free up your experts. 3. Lean Your ITSM Stack Fewer tools. Cleaner workflows. More room to think. Visibility ↳ Build reports that connect tools to outcomes. If you can’t measure value, it’s probably costing you. Efficiency ↳ Automate high-volume, low-thinking tasks. Focus your people on what requires judgment—not clicking boxes. Optimization ↳ Eliminate what’s unused or unloved. There’s no budget line for “we might use this someday.” Strategy ↳ Reinvest the savings. Don’t just slash—build. 4. Use the 4-Month Fix Plan Big wins don’t require big rollouts. Just a focused sprint. Month 1 – Take Inventory ↳ List every app, license, and system. No spin. Just get the facts. Month 2 – Cut Redundancy ↳ Merge what overlaps. Kill what doesn’t serve. Call your vendors. Month 3 – Automate Tasks ↳ Fix the annoying stuff. Automate it. Free up your team for better work. Month 4 – Realign Budget ↳ Apply recovered funds to high-impact projects. Show results in business terms, not ticket volume. Cutting costs doesn’t mean cutting effectiveness. With the right strategy, your team can spend less and deliver more. What’s one cost-saving move your team made that actually worked? ♻️ Repost if you believe IT can be efficient and excellent. 🔔 Follow Bob Roark for IT strategies that reduce chaos, not just budget lines.

🚀 Databricks Cost Reduction Strategies – Real Savings with Smart Optimization! 💰 💡 Interview Insight: Q: "Can you share some advanced strategies you've used to reduce costs, with examples and figures?" A: "Of course! Let’s explore some lesser-known yet highly effective cost optimization techniques." 🔥 Advanced Strategies That Delivered Real Savings 🔹 1️⃣ Optimizing Job Scheduling & Cluster Management ✅ Approach: Grouped jobs with similar resource needs and execution times, running them sequentially on the same cluster to minimize spin-ups and terminations. 📉 Impact: Before: Frequent cluster starts → $8,000/month After: Grouping reduced initialization by 50% → $5,000/month 💰 Savings: $3,000/month (37.5% reduction) 🔹 2️⃣ Dynamic Resource Allocation Based on Workload Patterns ✅ Approach: Analyzed workload trends to predict peak usage and dynamically adjusted cluster sizes, reducing over-provisioning during non-peak hours. 📉 Impact: Before: Over-provisioned clusters → $10,000/month After: Dynamic scaling → $6,000/month 💰 Savings: $4,000/month (40% reduction) 🔹 3️⃣ Optimized Job Execution Using Notebooks ✅ Approach: Modularized notebooks to avoid unnecessary execution, ran only essential parts, and reused cached results. 📉 Impact: Before: Full notebook execution → $7,000/month After: Selective execution → $4,500/month 💰 Savings: $2,500/month (35.7% reduction) 🔹 4️⃣ Incremental Data Processing to Cut Ingestion Costs ✅ Approach: Instead of processing full datasets, switched to incremental processing with Delta Lake to handle only data changes. 📉 Impact: Before: Full dataset processing → $12,000/month After: Incremental processing → $6,000/month 💰 Savings: $6,000/month (50% reduction) 🎯 Bonus: Storage Optimization 📦 By storing fewer interim datasets, storage costs dropped from $3,000/month to $1,800/month—a 40% reduction! 💭 Your Take? Which of these strategies have you tried? Any unique cost-saving techniques you’ve implemented? Let’s discuss in the comments! 👇 Follow Dattatraya shinde Connect 1:1 ? https://lnkd.in/egRCnmuR #Databricks #CostOptimization #CloudSavings #DataEngineering #FinOps #CloudCostManagement

If you work on a data engineering or data science team, then cost reduction is likely a major point of discussion. Especially this time of year. As a data consultant, I have managed to save millions of dollars over the past few years. The surprising thing is much of those expenses come from the same usual suspects(perhaps it's not that surprising). 1. Make sure you set up partitions or clusters where needed 2. Don't build a view, on view, on view mess that takes 10 minutes to run and is used for a heavily used dashboard 3. Check to ensure you've set Snowflake idle time to 1 minute(when it makes sense) 4. Make sure you've optimized your data ingestion solution(if you're paying 100k a year for ingestion, we should talk!) 5. Have some level of governance on who can build in production 6. Create a process to review costs every month or so. New projects and workflows can suddenly increase costs and if you're not constantly ensuring your costs are managed, they will explode I'd love to hear your tips as well!