Dashboards Don't Save Money, Action Does ft. Cristian Magherusan-Stanciu, Leaner Cloud

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Why do cloud costs stay high even after you build all the right dashboards? In this episode of FinOps in Action, I sit down with Cristian Magherusan-Stanciu, Founder and Cloud Optimization Specialist at Leaner Cloud. With over 20 years in systems engineering and a background at Nokia, HERE Technologies, and AWS, Cristian built AutoSpotting, an open source tool that has helped more than 10,000 customers save money on EC2. Cristian shared his hard-won framework for turning cloud cost insights into real savings, why automation alone will never be enough, and how AI has multiplied his output as a solo operator by an order of magnitude. We also covered the hidden business context that can turn a routine optimization into a $30K/month win, and why cost avoidance is just as important as cost reduction when your cloud bill keeps growing. Here’s what we talked about: * Dashboards are only half the story and prioritize action over visibility. The biggest gains come to teams that actually implement recommendations, not just track them. * Right size incrementally, not aggressively. Cutting a resource by 8x in one step is risky instead halve it, observe, and iterate to avoid introducing performance problems. * Match your optimization approach to the application’s needs. Latency sensitive workloads, HA setups, and DR resources may appear wasteful but serve critical purposes and always bring engineering context into the conversation. * Look beyond the metric to find the real opportunity. A $30K/month Aurora IO bill pointed to a forgotten database no one needed anymore and the fix wasn’t optimization, it was deletion. * Track cost avoidance, not just savings. In high-growth environments, a flat or rising bill can still represent millions saved and measure what you would have paid without the work. * AI has changed the game for solo practitioners. Cristian built in weeks what previously took a year or two, enabling him to ship a SaaS product and 30+ optimization tools as a one-person shop. Chapters: 00:00 - Dashboards Don't Save Money 00:19 - Show And Guest Intro 01:47 - Take Action First 04:00 - From Level Zero To Savings 06:08 - Prioritize Engineer Time 07:35 - Automation Without Breaking Things 10:07 - Working With DevOps And Devs 12:05 - When Engineers Push Back 14:17 - Cost Vs Risk And Context 16:09 - Big Wins That Repeat 20:00 - Common Waste Patterns 21:17 - The 30K Database Shutdown 24:19 - Proving Value Amid Growth 31:44 - AI Boosting FinOps Output 🎧 Subscribe for more FinOps leadership conversations → https://www.finopsinaction.com/ [https://www.finopsinaction.com/] Quote of the Show: * "In just a few weeks with AI, I built what previously would have taken me a year or two. It's at least an order of magnitude more output per unit of time." - Cristian Magherusan-Stanciu Links: * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristimagherusan/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristimagherusan/] * Website: https://leanercloud.com/ [https://leanercloud.com/] * Website: https://autospotting.io/ [https://autospotting.io/] Ways to Tune In: * Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/f25a9d18-c12f-4ee4-93f5-2aa96e509b55 [https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/f25a9d18-c12f-4ee4-93f5-2aa96e509b55] * Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/finops-in-action/id1790497808 [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/finops-in-action/id1790497808] * iHeart Radio: https://iheart.com/podcast/268443483/ [https://iheart.com/podcast/268443483/] * Podchaser: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/finops-in-action-5958339 [https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/finops-in-action-5958339] * Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3IpjMc3qxDXZAjic5Zq21t [https://open.spotify.com/show/3IpjMc3qxDXZAjic5Zq21t] * Substack: https://finopsinaction.substack.com/ [https://finopsinaction.substack.com/] * Transistor: finopsinaction.com [http://finopsinaction.com] * YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@PointFiveCloudCostEfficiency [https://www.youtube.com/@PointFiveCloudCostEfficiency]

Engineering Enterprise FinOps ft. Piotr Kuczmera | Ep # 72

What if the biggest mistake your FinOps program makes is skipping the requirements phase entirely? In this episode of FinOps in Action, host Taylor Houck sits down with Piotr Kuczmera, Head of FinOps at ZF Group, to unpack how he built a FinOps practice from scratch at a 150,000 person global enterprise, and why the first question every organization should ask is not "how do we cut costs" but "what exactly do we need?" Piotr shares how a single report request from his manager five years ago turned into a full scale internal FinOps platform, a hub and spoke operating model across 15 to 20 business units, and a team built on the combination of FinOps practitioners and data engineers working side by side. Here is what they covered: * Why FinOps is more than cost savings. Piotr explains that equating FinOps with cost optimization alone leads to failed implementations, and that starting with a clear requirements conversation, like a tailor fitting a suit to the right occasion, is what sets a practice up for long term success. * How chargeback became the turning point. When ZF connected individual names to specific budgets and sent real invoices, something clicked. Engineers and budget holders stopped asking about aggregate project spend and started asking "why am I paying this much and how do I reduce it?" * The case for building your own platform. ZF evaluated the major third party FinOps tools and walked away. Licensing costs, limited multi-cloud support, and a lack of flexibility in adapting to existing finance and procurement processes all pointed toward a homegrown solution built on native cloud tooling and a BI layer they already owned. * The hub and spoke model for FinOps at scale. At the center sits a core team of FinOps consultants and data engineers. In each business unit, a nominated budget owner and a FinOps champion bridge the gap between central strategy and local execution. * AI for FinOps, not just FinOps for AI. Piotr is most energized by how AI can automate repetitive FinOps workflows and take recommendations beyond basic CPU and memory parameters to consider commitment connections, usage patterns, and resource families all at once. He also sees FinOps as a function that should open doors for AI adoption, not slow it down. * FinOps as connective tissue. Across financial colleagues, engineering teams, and business managers, Piotr sees FinOps as the function responsible for translating the right information to the right persona, not flooding finance with VM data, and not giving engineers a budget variance they cannot act on. Chapters: 01:27 Meet Piotr Kuczmera 02:14 FinOps Is Not Just Cost Savings 03:30 Building Trust Across Departments 05:00 The FinOps Team Structure at ZF Group 08:00 Hub and Spoke: Champions and Budget Owners 10:00 Scale and Cadence Across 15 to 20 Categories 12:00 Back to the Beginning: One Report at a Time 14:00 Build vs Buy: The Platform Decision 18:00 Why Ownership of Data Changes Everything 21:00 Chargeback as the Accountability Switch 23:00 Translating FinOps Across Personas 25:00 FinOps as Connective Tissue 26:00 AI for FinOps and FinOps for AI 29:00 Treating AI Spend Like Any Other Cloud Service 30:00 What the Well Tailored FinOps Suit Looks Like in One Year 31:00 From Math Degree to FinOps Leader 33:00 Advice for Early Career FinOps Professionals 34:00 Where to Find Piotr Quote of the Show: * "Stay humble and don't be afraid of challenges." -- Piotr Kuczmera 🎧 Subscribe for more FinOps leadership conversations: https://www.finopsinaction.com/ [https://www.finopsinaction.com/] Links: * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/piotr-kuczmera-59b39712a/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/piotr-kuczmera-59b39712a/] * Website: https://www.zf.com/usa_canada/en/home/home.html [https://www.zf.com/usa_canada/en/home/home.html] Ways to Tune In: * Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/f25a9d18-c12f-4ee4-93f5-2aa96e509b55 [https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/f25a9d18-c12f-4ee4-93f5-2aa96e509b55] * Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/finops-in-action/id1790497808 [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/finops-in-action/id1790497808] * iHeart Radio: https://iheart.com/podcast/268443483/ [https://iheart.com/podcast/268443483/] * Podchaser: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/finops-in-action-5958339 [https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/finops-in-action-5958339] * Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3IpjMc3qxDXZAjic5Zq21t [https://open.spotify.com/show/3IpjMc3qxDXZAjic5Zq21t] * Substack: https://finopsinaction.substack.com/ [https://finopsinaction.substack.com/] * Transistor: finopsinaction.com [http://finopsinaction.com] * YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@PointFive_Inc [https://www.youtube.com/@PointFive_Inc]

4 de jun de 202634 min

Dashboards Don't Save Money, Action Does ft. Cristian Magherusan-Stanciu, Leaner Cloud | Ep # 66

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