Microsoft Azure offers an incredibly rich ecosystem for building, deploying, and managing applications. However, without a strategic approach to resource management, inefficiencies that lead to bill shock or under-utilisation can creep in. Maximising your Azure investment means actively identifying and resolving these inefficiencies.
Here are five key steps to help you spot inefficiencies and drive continuous optimisation within your Azure environment.
Step 1: Gain comprehensive visibility with Azure monitoring and cost management
You can’t optimise what you can’t see or understand. The foundational step to tackling Azure inefficiencies is establishing a clear, holistic view of your entire Azure footprint, encompassing performance, health, and cost allocation.
Action: Leverage Azure Monitor to collect and analyse metrics and logs from all your Azure resources (VMs, App Services, databases). Utilise Log Analytics Workspaces for centralised log collection and analysis and, for application-level insights, deploy Application Insights. Critically, use Azure Cost Management + Billing for detailed cost analysis, understanding spending patterns by resource group, tag, and service.
Optimisation Focus: Proactive identification of idle resources, performance bottlenecks indicated by high latency or low throughput, and unexpected cost spikes. Azure Cost Management + Billing will highlight where your money is going and identify anomalous spending.
Cloud Direct customers get access to the Provide™ Portal as their single-pane-of-glass view for all Azure resources. This platform includes everything from spend monitoring, managing licenses, raising support tickets, and tips for performance and security improvements.
Step 2: Right-size and rationalise your Azure resources
Over-provisioning is a primary driver of unnecessary costs in Azure. Many resources are initially deployed with more capacity than required, leading to consistent under-utilisation.
Action: Regularly review the “Cost” and “Performance” recommendations within Azure Advisor, which provides personalised, actionable advice to right-size VMs, Azure SQL Databases, and other resources based on actual usage patterns. Downsize VM SKUs, adjust Azure SQL Database service tiers (from General Purpose to Basic/Standard if appropriate, for example), and utilise Blob Storage tiers (Hot, Cool, Archive) to match data access frequency. Identify and decommission unused resources like orphaned disks, unattached public IP addresses, and idle ExpressRoute circuits, and use Azure Resource Graph queries to find “zombie” resources.
Optimisation Focus: Directly reduce infrastructure costs by matching resource allocation precisely to demand, eliminating waste from over-provisioning and idle assets.
Step 3: Implement strong Azure governance and cost policies
Without robust governance, “Azure sprawl” can quickly lead to an uncontrolled explosion in costs. Establishing clear policies and processes for resource provisioning, tagging, and budget management is critical to prevent inefficiencies before they take hold.
Action: Define a comprehensive Azure Tagging strategy (for cost centres, environments, owners) and enforce it using Azure Policy to ensure resources are consistently tagged for granular cost reporting in Azure Cost Management. Set up budgets and spending alerts in Azure Cost Management + Billing at the subscription or resource group level. Implementing Azure Policy will also enable you to enforce compliance such as restricting regions, disallowing specific resource types, or automatically shutting down VMs in Dev/Test subscriptions after hours, while Azure DevTest Labs can be used for development environments, which offers built-in auto-shutdown features.
Optimisation Focus: Gaining control over spending, improving accountability, preventing shadow IT, and ensuring that Azure resources are provisioned and used according to organisational guidelines.
Step 4: Leverage Azure automation and Infrastructure-as-Code for efficiency
Manual processes in Azure are not only time-consuming but also prone to errors and inconsistency, which only hinder efficiency. Automation is key to streamlining operations and ensuring consistent, cost-effective deployments.
Action: Automate routine tasks using Azure Automation Runbooks (PowerShell, Python) for things like scheduled VM shutdowns, patch management, and backup operations. Implement Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) using ARM Templates or Bicep to define and deploy your Azure infrastructure in a consistent, repeatable, and version-controlled manner. Use Azure DevOps or GitHub Actions for CI/CD pipelines to automate deployments. For dynamic workloads, configure Azure Auto-scaling for Virtual Machine Scale Sets, App Services, and Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS).
Optimisation Focus: Reducing operational overhead, minimising human error, ensuring consistent and optimised configurations, and enabling your Azure infrastructure to dynamically adapt to demand, thereby using resources more efficiently.
Step 5: Foster a culture of continuous Azure optimisation
Cloud optimisation in Azure isn’t a one-time project; it’s an ongoing commitment. The dynamic nature of the cloud and evolving business needs require a continuous loop of review, refinement, and improvement.
Action: Embrace FinOps principles, fostering collaboration between finance, operations, and development teams to drive cost accountability and efficiency. Schedule regular reviews of Azure spend and performance metrics using Azure Cost Management dashboards. Continuously monitor Azure Advisor for new recommendations. Stay informed about new Azure services, features, and pricing models (such as Azure Reservations for significant savings on consistent workloads, Azure Hybrid Benefit for existing Windows Server/SQL Server licences). Actively engage with Azure’s Well-Architected Framework, particularly its Cost Optimisation pillar.
Optimisation Focus: Embedding cost awareness and efficiency into your organisational culture, ensuring that optimisation becomes a routine part of your Azure operations, leading to sustained cost savings and improved performance over time.
The Result
By systematically taking these five actions, you can effectively identify and eliminate inefficiencies and create a more cost-effective, performant, and resilient Azure environment. This proactive approach not only saves money, but also frees up resources to drive innovation and support your strategic goals on the Microsoft Azure platform.
If you want to learn more about driving optimising inefficiencies in your Azure environment, then an Innovation Workshop will provide a platform for us to collaboratively examine your business context, and identify opportunities for maximising the return from your Azure spend.
