When a network doesn’t perform as it should, it can not only be incredibly frustrating but costly. Cisco notes that IT outages cost North American businesses $700 billion every year and that even just an hour of downtime can cost an average of $250,000 to $300,000. These losses don’t stop at revenue but can also impact internal productivity, mitigation costs, and even the brand.

It’s clear to see that your network is integral to your business’ success, but how can you ensure that your network is surviving and thriving?
A good place to start is recognising the number one mistake businesses are making with their networks.

The Big Mistake: Expecting a legacy network to meet new demands

The way businesses operate has changed substantially over the past couple of years. Yet, many still expect their traditional Wi-Fi setups to be optimised for the new way of working. Traditional networks designed predominantly for things like emails and a few web pages now have the challenge of handling the greater bandwidth requirements of real-time applications such as VoIP or WebEx and doing so securely. In fact, an access point that previously supported 50 clients might now only be able to handle 12 real-time applications showcasing the importance of reviewing your business’ network infrastructure and ensuring it is set up to meet the new demands of the modern workplace.

 

The new demands

Increased usage and upgrades

With the hybrid working model standing strong as the new normal, there has been a substantial increase in real-time applications in the business space. We see applications such as Cisco WebEx, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams that are not only being used more but seeing upgrades to higher resolutions – up to 4k in some instances! So, the bandwidth requirements are much greater than they once were and most of our networks were simply not set up with this future in mind.

Automation

In addition to the massive increase in usage and significant upgrades, there’s also the element of automation in today’s business-critical applications to consider. Automation can improve your business’ productivity and efficiency and help deliver accurate and important real-time information. However, to ensure that crucial automations are triggered when needed, you need low latency and virtually no jitter – something that legacy networks struggle to provide reliably and consistently.

Take your security solutions, for example. There’s an abundance of vital automation built into these solutions (e.g. a threat is detected, a quarantine is initiated, and an alert is sent to the security engineer on Cisco WebEx, all via automation). If your network is suffering from high latency, these security operations will be delayed, potentially leaving your environment vulnerable.

Workforce Security

In 2021, there was a 102% increase in ransomware attacks. With more people working remotely, the edges of the network have expanded well beyond the data centre, bringing new opportunities for cyber-attacks and security challenges for businesses. There are more roaming devices to protect, widespread use of cloud-based applications and services, and an ever-expanding plethora of sensitive data put through our networks.

When it comes to your network, it’s vital that a traditional office-based design is not used to cater to your new hybrid or remote working model. Network security should extend from the office to the home office and all roaming devices to keep your data safe.

 

What you can do about it

A great place to start is getting a Natilik network expert on board to help assess your current setup and design a network solution for your business that can cope with the demands of the new way of working and the incredible advancements in tech. They’ll be tuned in to the latest best practise, getting you set up so that you’re not only ready to take on the new environment but ready for the future.

Ready to take your network to the next level and see your business thrive? Book a free Wi-Fi Assessment with Natilik, consisting of a one-on-one discovery session with a Natilik Technical Architect, where they will deep dive into the key challenges you are facing and the outcomes you’re looking to achieve. Following this, recommendations will be made for the next steps to enable you to achieve your desired network.

It’s time to get ready for the future of networking 🌐

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