In today's fast-paced digital landscape, managing software licenses has become a critical task for organizations of all sizes. The active and efficient management of your organization’s licenses for SaaS and UCaaS solutions (such as Microsoft Teams and Zoom) not only ensures compliance with legal requirements and company policy but also holds the key to optimizing costs and maximizing the value of your software investments.
To navigate the complexities of software license management successfully, it is essential to focus on three key components: license visibility, control, and optimization. By integrating these pillars into your cloud application management strategy, your organization can effectively control software usage, mitigate risks, and unlock the full potential of your software assets.
Pillar #1: License Visibility
The first step of effective software license management is license visibility, which can help organizations avoid unnecessary expenses, remove redundancies in their SaaS application estate, and establish a solid foundation for efficient license management. True visibility into your license environment encompasses several other critical elements that go beyond mere procurement, such as intelligent software license provisioning, which ensures that the acquired licenses are allocated and deployed efficiently across the organization. Additionally, comprehensive license visibility necessitates accurate usage reporting, enabling organizations to track how their software licenses are utilized across different teams and departments. This reporting sheds light on potential redundancies, underutilization, or even unauthorized usage, facilitating proactive license management.
A holistic view of software license visibility extends to gaining insight into spend, enabling organizations to analyze and optimize their software license expenses. By considering these additional components, you can achieve a comprehensive understanding of your organization’s software license landscape and make informed decisions regarding procurement, allocation, and cost optimization.
Pillar #2: License Control
Once you are fully aware of the licenses being used within your organization’s technology environment, the next key to effective license management is control. License control involves activities such as tracking and monitoring the deployment of software licenses, managing license usage and entitlements, conducting periodic license audits, and ensuring that the organization is not using more licenses than it has purchased.
For SaaS licenses, organizations need to track user access and manage license entitlements to prevent unauthorized usage. This may involve implementing role-based access controls and periodic reviews of user permissions. Compliance also entails monitoring the number of active users to ensure that the organization does not exceed the licensed limit.
UCaaS license compliance requires monitoring the usage of communication features, such as voice, video, and messaging. Organizations should track the number of concurrent sessions, call minutes, or other usage metrics specified in the license agreement. Regular audits are essential to verify compliance with license agreements, detect any unauthorized usage, and uncover unnecessary spending.
Pillar #3: License Optimization
With visibility into your cloud application environment and control over license provisioning, usage, and plans, the final pillar of effective software license management is optimization. License optimization aims to maximize the value and efficiency of software licenses within the organization. This involves activities such as optimizing license usage to avoid underutilization or overutilization, implementing license management tools and processes, identifying opportunities for license consolidation, and exploring alternative subscription or licensing models to optimize costs. By understanding usage patterns and trends, organizations can make informed decisions about license procurement, reallocation, and spending.
One opportunity for optimization is license consolidation and standardization. By consolidating licenses, organizations can reduce complexity, streamline operations, and eliminate redundant or overlapping software solutions. Standardizing cloud applications to a limited number of software vendors or products can also simplify license management, enhance vendor relationships, and potentially enable negotiation for better pricing or support terms.
Exploring alternative licensing models or subscription options can optimize costs while meeting software requirements. Organizations should assess whether a perpetual license or a subscription-based license suits their needs better. Subscription-based licensing models can offer flexibility, scalability, and predictable costs.
Continuous monitoring and evaluation of license usage and entitlements are essential. By regularly reviewing license utilization reports, organizations can identify trends, anticipate future needs, and optimize license allocations based on actual usage.
Don't Go It Alone: Utilize Automated Software License Management
In the dynamic realm of cloud application license management, organizations can greatly benefit from leveraging a cloud application management tool. Contact the Calero team of experts today to learn more!
