Rowan Rey Sutherland 
Planning and maintaining your network infrastructure can be a complicated business. In this post, you’ll find easy tips that will guide you through the process of planning your network, identifying any possible risks or security vulnerabilities, and taking steps for ensuring its ongoing stability. If Network Infrastructure planning and maintenance still seems too complicated, we suggest Managed IT Services, where outsourced IT professionals will maintain your Network Infrastructure as part of your contract.
What is a Network Infrastructure?
Network infrastructures are the basic components that make up a network. This includes the physical devices, the switches, cabling, and wireless systems. Network infrastructure also includes the computers, servers, routers, and other hardware that network traffic passes through. A Network infrastructure allows for effective communication and service between users, applications, services, and devices.
Planning for your network infrastructure
Planning for network infrastructure is an important part of running a successful business.
We recommend a design and management methodology that spans the entire network life cycle, as follows.
Prepare: Business agility is the result of good preparation. This phase includes considerations, technologies, and a broad vision to help create a more competitive business.
Plan: Successful deployment of any technology requires an accurate assessment of the current state of your network, its security posture, and whether the business is prepared to support the chosen solution.
Design: A detailed design reduces the risk, avoids delays, and controls the total cost of projects.
Implement: This is where the company works to integrate devices and new capabilities without compromising network performance.
Operate: The firm proactively monitors the network to prevent disruptions and monitor outages while maintaining high availability, reliability, and security.
Optimize: Competitive networks never stop looking for new ways to grow. Continuous improvement is a mainstay of any successful network lifecycle.
Managing your infrastructure
Managing your infrastructure isn’t as hard as it seems. It is a continual process, and you must invest time and resources into planning and maintaining it. The first step that I recommend is to designate a team member to be the “network administrator.” This person will maintain and grow your network, which will help limit downtime due to human error.
One of the most detrimental mistakes you can make as a business is to not maintain your IT infrastructure. Chances are that when you established your new location or set up your current server; you put a lot of thought and work into building it. But have you put much time or thought into these elements since then?
There are some key tasks that you need to perform periodically. Maintenance ensures optimal ongoing performance and maintenance. Now, whether you choose to perform these tasks yourself, or hire an outsourced IT service company; that’s completely up to you! The most important thing is that someone is performing these maintenance jobs; to keep your business operating smoothly.
Here are five key functions to ensure a well-maintained infrastructure:
- Auditing
- Updates
- Backups
- Review, Upgrade & Streamline
- Security
Conclusion
Without a network infrastructure, your business can’t work. Communication, employee productivity, and customer satisfaction all depend on stable network connections. If all this still seems overly complicated and confusing, take the pressure off your business by outsourcing your Managed IT Services Brisbane.
