WHERE IT'S BREAKING
Tool Review: Keep, Merge or Retire
Tool sprawl rarely starts as a decision. This piece inventories every tool, who uses it and who has admin, maps overlap, names a system of record for each kind of data, reviews access, scores each tool on use, fit, integration and ownership, and sequences a consolidation plan that retires tools last, after the data has moved.
What it looks like
- Fourteen tools and subscriptions, bought by five different people.
- Two project tools, two e-signature tools and three places that hold customer data.
- Two former employees still have active logins.
- Nobody can say which tools renew when or who is allowed to cancel them.
The ask:“What am I paying for, what do we actually use, and what can go?”
How I'd work through it
- Inventory first, including the free tools and the ones nobody mentions.
- Check actual use. Subscriptions are not the same as use.
- Map overlap by job, not by name.
- Name a system of record for each kind of data.
- Review access, admins, shared logins and former staff.
- Retire a tool last, after the data has moved.
What gets built
- Tool inventory with owner, users, admin, plan and renewal month
- Capability overlap matrix
- System-of-record map
- Access review and offboarding checklist
- Four-question tool scorecard with verdicts
- Migration roadmap and stack register
Walkthrough
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