Print this or copy it into a spreadsheet. Fill one row per paid app. Do not research alternatives until the sheet is complete. Comparison theater is how audits stall.
Scoring rules (be harsh)
- Keep if someone used it for real work in the last 14 days AND no other Keep app does the same job.
- Cut if last login > 30 days, or the only fan is a vendor email.
- Merge if two Keep apps share 70%+ of the job. Pick one canonical tool the same day.
How to fill Last real use without guessing
Do not ask the team “do we still use this?” People defend tools they might need someday. Open the product’s admin: last login, last document edited, last campaign sent. If the vendor hides that data, search your email for the last “your invoice” and your password manager for the last autofill. Absence of evidence is a Cut, not a Keep.
Shared logins confuse the date. If three people use one account, the last login only proves someone breathed on the tool. Ask: which job did it do last week that no other Keep row already covers? If the answer is “it has a nice dashboard,” mark Cut.
Where stacks bloat
Duplicate project trackers, “temporary” docs tools, marketing apps bought for one campaign, and AI wrappers that summarize meetings nobody reads. Bloat is rarely malice. It is optimism purchased on a credit card. Seasonal tools are a special trap: a tax plugin used four weeks a year can still be Keep if April would hurt without it. Mark the off-season in the notes so you do not Cut it in November and panic in March.
Worked row examples
- Project board B — last real use 47 days ago; Board A already holds client work. Cut. Export active cards first.
- Email marketing — campaign last Tuesday; no other Keep does broadcast mail. Keep. Name an owner.
- Docs suite + cloud drive — both hold files; drive is where people actually search. Merge into the drive. Set a Friday cutover.
After the sheet
- Cancel Cuts this week — not after “one more export.” Calendar the export for tomorrow morning if you must, then cancel the same afternoon.
- Announce Merges with a cutover date and a dead-link note in chat. Dual systems that linger become permanent.
- Freeze new purchases for 30 days unless a Keep tool is blocking revenue. Write the freeze in the same note as the worksheet.
- Re-run the worksheet quarterly for 25 minutes. The goal is not a perfect stack. It is preventing silent re-accumulation.
What not to do
Do not negotiate a discount on a Cut. Cheaper waste is still waste. Do not replace three Cuts with one “all-in-one” the same week; you will recreate overlap with extra migration pain. Do not let a vendor success manager schedule a “value review” before you cancel. Their job is retention. Yours is a shorter list.
If you want a narrative example of this method in the wild, read the six-person stack cut case study.