Approach Your Learning Content Library Like a CFO

Emily Gerson

quinta-feira, 11 de dezembro de 2025

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We’re seeing an explosion of content everywhere, from streaming services in our personal lives to the massive, often underutilized, learning content libraries we have access to at work. This content sprawl could represent a huge opportunity to save money, even while improving learning outcomes. Here’s why:

Your challenge isn’t content availability, it’s content waste.

On average, organizations spend $1,580 per employee per year on L&D, and based on calculations by Degreed Value Engineering, approximately 80% of that investment is spent on purchasing content alone. The result is that much of this spend might go to underutilized, duplicative, or difficult-to-find resources. 

And if you can uncover the saving opportunities, you can ensure your L&D budget is spent only on the highest impact efforts and initiatives.

To see the opportunities, try looking at it like your Chief Financial Officer (CFO) would.

Learning and development is a business initiative that requires investment, and as with any business initiative, it also needs a clear Return on Investment (ROI). For a CFO, the goal is optimizing the investment side of the equation while maintaining or improving learning and talent outcomes. 

What a CFO is Really Looking For: The ROI Equation

When L&D teams approach the CFO to discuss learning content spend and potential savings, Degreed CFO Sandeep Beotra recommends a clear, crisp one-page ROI calculation. 

For a finance leader, the core equation is always: ROI, or Return / Investment. There are more complex equations for figuring this (gain from investment – cost of investment / cost of investment x 100). But at the end of the day, Beotra notes that you should focus on the importance of two key variables: cost and usage.

“If you’re paying for something which barely gets used on a weighted average basis, that’s not worthwhile at all.” – Sandeep Beotra, CFO at Degreed

The goal is to optimize the investment (the denominator) while minimizing, or even improving, employee’s consumption patterns (the numerator).

But that doesn’t mean low use calls for immediate cost-cutting. For example, Beotra suggests that while compliance or premium strategic content might have low usage, it has a high and sometimes even business-critical return. The overall picture should map a comprehensive cost and utilization strategy that advocates for what you need to succeed.

3 Core Buckets of Content Waste and How to Solve Them

The budget drain on content can typically be bucketed into three specific and measurable areas that your teams can start tackling today:

1. Vendor overlap

With multiple content vendors in play, you likely have multiple vendors providing strikingly similar content focused on the same core skills. This vendor overlap is common, especially in large organizations.

• The problem: You’re paying multiple times for the same skill development content. 
• The solution: Identify and consolidate. Retire or reduce vendor contracts at renewal time. Consolidation doesn’t just cut the contract cost; it also reduces the overhead cost associated with procurement, IT, and legal management for each vendor.

2. The hidden cost of maintenance curation

If your content is scattered across multiple providers, a team member is likely spending time curating, tagging, and maintaining those separate catalogs, creating a “maintenance tax.”

• The problem: Skilled employees are doing low-value, repetitive work that drains productivity.
• The solution: Centralize and automate curation. Consolidating into a platform that is governed, tagged, and refreshed, means maintenance is near non-existent. This frees up your talent to be redeployed into much more high-value, strategic work.

3. Overpaying for under-use

Many organizations are still purchasing content licenses based on their headcount rather than verified usage. This creates “shelfware,” where you renew contracts year after year despite zero activation.

• The problem: You have learning content licenses that aren’t being utilized, but you’re still paying for them.
• The solution: Right-size your contracts. Review usage data to determine actual need and ensure you have learner engagement programs in place. Then, instead of cutting access entirely, use high-quality, existing content to meet the need for those audiences while reducing licensing costs. 

Measuring ROI in Learning Capitalizing on Content Library Savings

Looking at learning content through a CFO lens can help you leverage a business-driven approach to skill development that execs will understand and respond to. If a sizable percentage of your L&D budget is going to content providers (as is often the case), there are ample opportunities to find cost savings without losing effectiveness. 

By freeing up funds, you can demonstrate the cost-savings and efficiency leaders look for. You will also enable the L&D team to spend time on more valuable, high-impact tasks, and invest in more innovative, dynamic approaches to learning. With less content noise, employees find the right content more easily, boosting employee engagement and making the most of every minute spent learning. 

Looking to cut content waste and unlock real ROI from your learning investments? Book a free consultation with one of our professional services experts to talk through your content challenges, explore where you could save based on overlap, and see how tailored, AI-curated learning pathways can streamline your library.