I mean, from a certain perspective, nearly everything management tries to do is a cost-saving tactic, but I wouldn't say that measuring performance is primarily about "cost savings". It's more about making sure that people are doing the job they were hired to do—which, on the face of it, is definitely a valuable thing to be doing.
The problem is when it's being used as a whip to get people to work ever harder with no more pay and no more support than before.
Doubling engineers while keeping the same amount of work is something that can increase resiliency—both in the engineers themselves and in the business. Making sure you have at least, say, 125%-150% coverage of all duties makes a huge difference in everyone's stress levels, and makes sure that if someone gets sick, gets hit by a bus, or just goes on vacation, their duties neither stop getting done, nor get piled onto other people who are already at 100% (or more) capacity.
The problem is when it's being used as a whip to get people to work ever harder with no more pay and no more support than before.
Doubling engineers while keeping the same amount of work is something that can increase resiliency—both in the engineers themselves and in the business. Making sure you have at least, say, 125%-150% coverage of all duties makes a huge difference in everyone's stress levels, and makes sure that if someone gets sick, gets hit by a bus, or just goes on vacation, their duties neither stop getting done, nor get piled onto other people who are already at 100% (or more) capacity.