Network consulting that starts with measuring, not drawing
A network design on paper is quickly produced. The questions that matter — what actually passes through, where the delay sits, what happens when this link disappears — only get answered by measuring in the environment itself.
Four moments when network consulting pays
Outside these four it is usually management rather than consulting, and then a consulting engagement is an expensive way to change a setting.
- A move or a new siteCabling, cabinet layout, wifi coverage and the line to the outside world are fixed for years in a new building. This is the only moment when getting it right costs nothing.
- Growth that pinchesMore people, more devices, more traffic over the same line. Measuring then shows whether the bottleneck sits in the line, in the wifi or in a setting — and those three cost very different things.
- Separation that has to happenProduction away from office, guests away from staff, third-party equipment on its own. Segmentation is not technically hard and is organisationally hard; the advice is mostly about what belongs where.
- A second opinion on a proposalThere is a quote from a supplier and the question is whether it holds up. We work through it without a sales interest of our own, and we say so when the proposal is good.
How it works
Three steps, and the first is the only one that must not be skipped.
Measure in the environment itself
What goes over the lines, how the wifi behaves in the places where work happens, and where the traffic actually goes. For wifi we do that with an on-site survey; a coverage picture from a drawing tool says nothing about a warehouse full of steel.
The design, with the trade-offs
Not only what we would do but why, and what the alternative was. That keeps the decision traceable, including when someone else looks at it in two years.
Build it or hand it over
We can build it, and we can hand it to whoever does the management. Advice that only we can carry out is not advice.
Further reading
What this connects to.
Questions we get about this
The ones that come up most, answered briefly.
Do you measure the wifi on site?
Yes, and that is why the advice holds. A coverage picture from a drawing tool says nothing about a warehouse full of steel or a freezer cell; only a measurement with the racking filled says anything.
Can you assess a proposal from another supplier?
Yes. We work through it without a sales interest of our own, and we say so when the proposal is good. Advice that only we can carry out is not advice.
A network you can explain
Tell us what is in place, where it pinches and what is coming. We measure before we draw, and we say so when nothing needs to change.
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