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Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

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Re: Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

#171

Post by mikorym »

annoyingnoob wrote: post #159

So many companies try to force you onto SaaS. Products that you previously had a perpetual license for are now SaaS only if you want to upgrade. O365 is the only SaaS platform that makes sense where I work. But we have a bunch of SaaS services because that is the only way the product is offered. I hate SaaS.

Yesterday there was yet another SaaS-like "solution" pushed to my employer.

I was like... I can do all of that in crontab.

The guy didn't know what crontab was.

I then said: "Well I guess one uses whatever your team members find most convenient." Everyone then agreed. But I think they didn't realise they were all agreeing on different things.

Re: Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

#172

Post by hinkley »

taleodor wrote: post #21
paxys wrote: post #8

If you are already spending >$200K per employee, spending another $10K to make them even 10% more productive is a bargain.

Exactly this. Unfortunately, way too often I see execs saying "that's too expensive, we just have to do it manually" instead of using good tool. Then what happens is somebody making $100+/hour would spend several hours to do the job that would be covered by a tool that costs under $50/month.

We got well over $80k into manpower on optimizing our self-hosted app for resources so that we didn't have to tell less than a dozen big customers to upgrade their hardware before people stopped laughing right in my face for suggesting we just buy them some new rackmount equipment as a gift...

That project died the following year, and I believe the opportunity costs of that work were substantially responsible for the demise.

Re: Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

#173

Post by mikorym »

paxys wrote: post #8

If you are already spending >$200K per employee, spending another $10K to make them even 10% more productive is a bargain.

I think maybe I misunderstood the headline then.

Is the expectation that your employees cost > $200k or is that not qualified?

In some companies / countries you spend $10k per employee.

Re: Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

#174

Post by cactus2093 »

dclusin wrote: post #119
genghisjahn wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where’s the list of awesome companies that succeed without managers?

Hard to find for sure. There was a time though when we didn't pay CEO's & professional managers 500x as much as the lowest paid employee. When we did that we still managed to go to the moon, split the atom, develop computers, create antibiotics, and lots of other neat things.

All of the examples you listed are either NASA or academic research, don't see what that has to do with CEO pay.

Re: Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

#175

Post by davidajackson »

taleodor wrote: post #21
paxys wrote: post #8

If you are already spending >$200K per employee, spending another $10K to make them even 10% more productive is a bargain.

Exactly this. Unfortunately, way too often I see execs saying "that's too expensive, we just have to do it manually" instead of using good tool. Then what happens is somebody making $100+/hour would spend several hours to do the job that would be covered by a tool that costs under $50/month.

Someone should build a webpage that does this:

1. Enter salary of engineer.

2. Enter cost per engineer of product (subscription, one time, etc.).

3. Enter required minutes to make worth your time (setup per employee can be factored in).

This may already exist, but if it doesn't it could be a useful tool for Saas companies. Something you could drop into emails to potential customers ("see how much you would save").

Would pay for this monthly if it works.

Re: Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

#177

Post by nirvdrum »

fhbdukfrh wrote: post #64
aguyfromnb wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then what happens is somebody making $100+/hour would spend several hours to do the job that would be covered by a tool that costs under $50/month. Sure, but then there's the slightly more complicated economic calculus: do we build our own tooling now, for a significant up front cost, or do we buy the SaaS which we might use essentially forever for an unknown future TCO?

How often do you build in house tooling or applications that have no ongoing operating commitments? It's upfront capital investment plus generally unpredictable maintenance vs. More predictable but maybe higher operating expenses

I don't know if more predictable is all that accurate. SaaS providers change functionality and UX regularly and that often breaks workflows. Then you have the ones that shut down or get bought out and then substantially change their offerings. Then there are those services that would have been private to an intranet, but are now public, and they get compromised.

I don't think it's clear-cut. Some SaaS has worked out remarkably well for me and others I wish I had just built the thing in-house. Also, few providers give a way to actually get your data back out in a usable fashion, so you tend to get locked in without substantial cost to back out.

Re: Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

#178

Post by gentleman11 »

jjoonathan wrote: post #147
jrs235 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's easy to say "yes" and difficult to say "no". Becoming a financial steward comes by first saying "no" and only saying "yes" when the ROI worksheet is filled out, completed, and approved. If you want your manager to approve spending some money on tools you can help them by filling out your own preliminary ROI worksheet to show them why you think it's a no-brainer.

Buying a $5/mo subscription by accident, forgetting about it for years, and getting 0 value in return is cheaper than training on a formal purchase system, filling out a ROI sheet, and ping-ponging it back and forth in a few meetings before "responsibly" deciding not to buy. Giving individual contributors purchase authority and then supervising spend -- the model implemented in every major cloud -- is a much better c…

What if that SAAS is data mining you though and your company secrets are leaking out? Or claiming some sort of ownership over content you post within it? I don’t know anyone who reads the privacy policies and TOS of those apps but tech companies just let their teams use what they like.

It’s hard to find a good SAAS privacy policy actually, and they target businesses who are theoretically more “serious” than individuals

Re: Companies fret as costs soar for software subscriptions (2019)

#180

Post by nexuist »

annoyingnoob wrote: post #159

So many companies try to force you onto SaaS. Products that you previously had a perpetual license for are now SaaS only if you want to upgrade. O365 is the only SaaS platform that makes sense where I work. But we have a bunch of SaaS services because that is the only way the product is offered. I hate SaaS.

SaaS sucks until you run a SaaS company, then SaaS is the greatest business strategy since someone decided to sell books on the Internet.
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