Start here: FinOps and IT
You own cloud cost as a job, not as a monthly surprise. You want to know what changed, why, whose it is, and what to do about it, ideally before someone else asks.
Set your view to Practitioner (your avatar ▸ Profile & preferences ▸ View). It’s the default, and the one that shows every screen. Your Overview leads with Optimizable spend, idle and orphaned resources, potential savings, and Open anomalies.
Learn it in this order
Section titled “Learn it in this order”1. The shape of the app. Finding your way around. Fifteen minutes that saves you hunting later.
2. The filters. Filtering every report at once. These are global, which trips people up once and never again.
3. Pick your cost basis. Effective cost vs billed cost. If you’re doing showback or chargeback, effective cost is the one you want, and it’s already the default.
4. Get fluent with one table. Working with tables, then spend twenty minutes on The Ledger grouping by different things until the bill stops being a mystery.
Your working week
Section titled “Your working week”Once you’re oriented, most days look like this:
- Anomalies first: anything that spiked, with a likely cause and an owner. Triage it: comment and reassign, snooze, or dismiss with a reason.
- Savings & Waste when you have time to spend well: every rightsizing and waste opportunity ranked by what it saves.
- The Ledger whenever anyone asks “why is this bill bigger?”
- Commitments monthly, to check coverage and catch anything expiring.
One thing to know early: you never mark an anomaly complete. CloudMonitor closes it itself once the spend returns to normal. Dismiss the ones that are expected; snooze the ones you’ll deal with later.
Setting it up properly
Section titled “Setting it up properly”If CloudMonitor is new to your organization and you’re the one configuring it, the setup checklist in Help & support walks the four configuration tasks that matter, in order: create your first cost group, allocate your costs, set a budget, and add your team. Guided tours offers a separate, optional product tour; taking it does not change setup progress.
Cost groups are the foundation: almost everything else reports against them, so time spent getting that hierarchy right pays back everywhere. The how-to articles cover each task.
Where to look things up
Section titled “Where to look things up”- Every screen and what it’s for: the full map.
- Roles and access, who can do what, and why a colleague can’t see a screen you can.
- Glossary of terms: when a word means something specific here.