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Optimise, HealthScan™

Independent Datadog health check
that tells you what's actually wrong, with evidence.

Most teams on Datadog for more than a year know something isn't right, alert noise is too high, dashboards aren't used, ownership mapping is unclear, costs have drifted. But without a structured assessment, it's hard to quantify the problem, prioritise fixes, or justify the investment to address them.

Read the full context

HealthScan is an independent, read-only review of your existing Datadog environment, a health scorecard, a prioritised improvement backlog, and stakeholder-ready findings, delivered in 1–2 weeks. Nothing is changed in your environment.

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Read-only
No changes to your environment
1–2 weeks
From kickoff to findings readout
Optimise
Phase two of the journey
Independent
Evidence, not sales collateral
The problem What we review Deliverables FAQ
Quick facts
PhaseOptimise
Duration1–2 weeks
AccessRead-only access to Datadog account
SessionsTwo customer sessions (kickoff + findings readout)
Best whenYou need stakeholder-ready evidence of what's broken before committing improvement budget
Natural path forward
  • Catalyst: to deliver the improvements HealthScan identifies
  • Managed Datadog: for ongoing platform management
01
The problem

You know something's wrong but you can't prove it or prioritise it

Engineering teams accumulate a general sense that their Datadog environment has problems, but general sense doesn't move budget. The specific symptoms are observable but unquantified. The fixes are obviously needed but unordered. The case for investment hasn't been made.

  • Alert noise is high enough that engineers have started ignoring pages, but nobody has audited the monitors or measured the false-positive rate
  • Dashboard usage is low, but nobody has mapped which views are actually used versus which were created and never touched again
  • Datadog costs have grown faster than coverage, but the cost profile hasn't been reviewed against what's actually generating signal
  • Ownership mapping has drifted as the team changed, services route alerts to the wrong people or nowhere at all
  • An improvement initiative has been proposed, but leadership needs evidence before approving the budget
  • A new CTO or platform lead wants an independent baseline before committing to a direction
02
What we review

Every domain of the Datadog deployment

HealthScan covers eight domains of a Datadog environment. Each is assessed against what good looks like and scored green, amber, or red.

Agent and infrastructure coverage
Which services are instrumented, how well, and what's missing.
Metrics, logs, monitors, and dashboards
Volume and quality of telemetry; monitor accuracy and noise; dashboard usage and relevance.
Tagging and naming standards
Consistency of tag taxonomy; naming conventions; compliance with established standards (or absence of them).
APM and service coverage
Distributed tracing accuracy; service map quality; APM configuration against the actual service architecture.
Security signals and CSPM
Security telemetry coverage; cloud security posture configuration; security signal operationalisation.
Cost and usage profile
Where Datadog spend is going; cost guardrails; usage relative to contract; cost-optimisation opportunities.
Ownership and governance
Service ownership mapping; escalation routing; governance standards and their enforcement.
Platform maturity
Overall assessment of Datadog maturity relative to the team's scale and operational requirements.
03
Deliverables

Findings you can act on and present

HealthScan closes with a findings readout and a complete deliverable package, structured for both the engineering team and a leadership audience.

◈
Health scorecard
Green, amber, red assessment of every domain reviewed, a single-page view of where the environment stands.
◈
Executive summary
A structured summary suitable for a CTO or engineering leadership presentation, what the assessment found and why it matters.
◈
Estate snapshot
Documentation of what was reviewed, services covered, agent versions, integration inventory, dashboard count, monitor count, as a baseline.
◈
Prioritised improvement backlog
Each finding mapped to a recommended action with impact and effort ratings, ordered to address the highest-value improvements first.
◈
Findings readout (included session)
A live session to walk through findings with Q&A, with both the engineering team and leadership stakeholders if needed.

FAQ

Questions about HealthScan.

Does Critical Cloud make any changes during a HealthScan?

No. HealthScan is entirely read-only. We review your environment and deliver findings, nothing is configured, modified, or deployed. Your environment is unchanged at the end of the engagement.

What does the HealthScan deliverable look like?

A health scorecard (green/amber/red by domain), an executive summary, an estate snapshot, and a prioritised improvement backlog with impact/effort ratings. Two included sessions: kickoff and findings readout with Q&A.

How new does our Datadog environment need to be?

HealthScan is most valuable for environments that have been running for at least six months, enough time for patterns of debt to emerge. For very new environments, HyperCare or LaunchPad are typically the better starting point.

Does HealthScan always lead to Catalyst?

Not necessarily. Sometimes findings show the environment is in better shape than expected. Sometimes they surface the need for Managed Datadog rather than a one-time fix. HealthScan gives you an honest picture, what happens next depends on what it finds.

What comes after HealthScan

The natural paths from a completed assessment.

Catalyst

The natural follow-on to HealthScan. Catalyst delivers the improvements the assessment identifies, practitioners who complete the approved backlog, not consultants who hand it back.

Managed Datadog

If HealthScan reveals the environment needs ongoing management rather than a one-time fix, Managed Datadog is the recurring engagement that keeps it clean as the platform grows.

UK Datadog partner

HealthScan is delivered by the world's first Powered by Datadog accredited MSP. The assessors are the same engineers who run Datadog in production every day.

Delivered by Critical Cloud, a Powered by Datadog accredited managed provider and Datadog Advanced Partner. Datadog certified one managed provider globally. We are it. ISO 27001 and Cyber Essentials Plus certified.

Need an independent view of your Datadog environment?

HealthScan delivers a clear picture of what's working and what isn't, in 1–2 weeks, read-only, with no disruption to your team or environment.

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