Cost containment is the business practice of controlling expense levels to prevent unnecessary spending or thoughtfully reducing expenses to improve profitability without risking long-term damage to the company. Change in a business’s overall circumstances commonly necessitates reviewing the entire cost structure. Axis has long experience in understanding the fixed and variable costs of operating IT infrastructure and systems.
Even relatively simple businesses require a portfolio of systems, technology services, and infrastructure plus all the employees, contractors, partners, and vendors to operate all the components. When top-line revenue declines, all aspects of the business need to respond, often requiring the asking of hard questions and making of difficult decisions. Previously successful organizations now faced with these decisions, often find themselves paralyzed – IT managers who have successfully supported growth often find it difficult to see and act upon cost-saving opportunities when looking at systems they have lovingly tended over the years. It’s an inability to see the forest for the trees’ situation.
Axis’ Cost Containment engagements are driven by two success factors – our Cost Containment methodology and seasoned executive resources who are both experienced CIOs in large/complex organizations and also have deep financial expertise – a number are both IT professionals and also CPAs. Our disciplined approach of reviewing the entire IT portfolio and all related support components along with key client personnel allows our teams to quickly evaluate the cost/benefit of each portfolio element.
Our tried and tested methodology evaluates each system by a number of attributes such as:
- criticality of the data output of the system
- number of regular users
- number of interfaces
- maintenance costs
- licensing cost
- overall importance to IT roadmap
The output of this work is clear and executable recommendations that will yield cost savings both in the near and long term without compromising the underlying health of our client’s business. We can support clients with aligning resources with the recommendations and assist in executing the transition plan to the new lower cost structure. Post transition, clients typically see operational efficiencies throughout their organization as streamlined IT processes allow other internal groups to optimize their own business processes.