Engineering Team ROI: How to Calculate and Present to Business
· 9 min read
Every quarter, CTOs face the same uncomfortable meeting. The CEO asks: "We spent $2.4M on engineering last quarter. What did we get for it?" And the answer is usually a list of shipped features — not a financial return.
Engineering is the largest cost center in most technology companies, yet it's the one with the least financial accountability. Marketing can show customer acquisition cost. Sales can show revenue per rep. Engineering shows... velocity points? McKinsey's analysis of software developer productivity highlights this gap: engineering output is measurable, but most organizations haven't built the systems to do it.
It's time to change that.