Business network resilience: Is your network ready for disruption?

Business Network Resilience: Most businesses don’t spend much time thinking about their network when it’s working.

People connect to WiFi, access cloud applications, make Teams calls, use business phone systems and share information without really considering what is happening behind the scenes.

It’s when something stops working that the network suddenly becomes everyone’s priority.

A slow connection, failed piece of hardware or internet outage can quickly affect an entire organisation. That’s why business network resilience isn’t simply about having a fast internet connection. It’s about designing the whole network so that it is reliable, secure, manageable and capable of supporting the way your business actually works.

At Xcomm, that’s where we start.

Rather than looking at individual pieces of networking equipment in isolation, we consider how connectivity, security, switching and WiFi work together – and what happens when something goes wrong.

What does business network resilience actually mean?

A resilient network is designed to keep your organisation connected and productive, while reducing the likelihood that a single problem causes widespread disruption.

That doesn’t necessarily mean building a hugely complicated enterprise network.

For a smaller business operating from one location, resilience might mean having reliable business connectivity, a properly configured firewall, good WiFi coverage and proactive monitoring.

For a larger or multi-site organisation, it could include multiple internet connections, higher-capacity networking equipment, centralised management and additional redundancy.

The important point is that business network resilience should be appropriate to the organisation. There’s little benefit in paying for complexity you don’t need. Equally, relying on infrastructure that your business has outgrown can become an expensive false economy.

Business network resilience starts with good network design

It’s tempting to approach networking one problem at a time.

The WiFi is poor, so another access point is added.

More devices are needed, so another switch is connected.

The internet is slow, so the broadband package is upgraded.

Individually, each decision may seem perfectly reasonable. Over time, however, this can create a network made up of different equipment, configurations and workarounds that becomes increasingly difficult to understand and manage.

Good business network resilience starts with looking at the network as a whole.

How many people use it?

How many devices are connected?

Which applications are business-critical?

How much traffic is travelling across the network?

Are there multiple sites?

What would happen if the primary internet connection failed?

And importantly, how is the business likely to change over the next few years?

Answering those questions allows the network to be designed around genuine requirements rather than simply responding to the latest problem.

Your firewall is about more than cyber security

The firewall sits between your business network and the outside world, so security is naturally one of its most important jobs. But it also plays an important role in network performance and resilience.

A business-grade firewall or gateway can manage traffic, provide visibility across the network and, depending on the solution, support more than one internet connection. If one connection experiences a problem, having a secondary connection can provide an additional layer of resilience.

The right solution depends on the organisation. A small single-site business doesn’t necessarily need the same equipment as an organisation operating from multiple locations with hundreds of connected devices. That’s why Xcomm sizes and configures firewall solutions according to the business rather than taking a one-size-fits-all approach.

Our Ubiquiti solutions use Ubiquiti hardware powered by the UniFi platform, with gateway options suitable for a wide range of network sizes and requirements.

For larger or more complex networking environments, Xcomm can also design and manage solutions using Cisco Meraki, giving us the flexibility to recommend the technology that’s best suited to the individual business rather than taking a one-size-fits-all approach.

Whichever platform is right for you, Xcomm designs, configures, monitors and supports the solution, so the technology is matched to the environment in which it will actually operate.

Don’t overlook your network switches

Switches aren’t usually the first thing people think about when discussing network resilience, but they’re fundamental to how a wired business network operates. Computers, servers, printers, IP phones, wireless access points and other network devices may all depend on them.

As a business grows, an older or underspecified switch can become a bottleneck.

It’s therefore important to consider not just how many devices need connecting today, but what might be required tomorrow.

Power over Ethernet – or PoE – can also simplify a network by allowing devices such as wireless access points and IP phones to receive power and data through the same network cable.

With managed switching, there is also much greater visibility of what’s happening across the network, making potential issues easier to identify.

Reliable WiFi is part of network resilience too

Wireless connectivity is no longer an optional extra for most businesses. Laptops, smartphones, tablets and an increasing number of business devices depend on WiFi. Poor wireless coverage can therefore be every bit as disruptive as a problem with the internet connection itself. And adding more access points isn’t automatically the answer.

Access points need to be positioned correctly and configured as part of the wider network. Too few can leave dead spots. Poor placement can reduce performance, while an environment with large numbers of users and devices needs to be designed accordingly.

A properly planned wireless network should provide consistent coverage and sufficient capacity for the people and devices using it.

Visibility makes problems easier to manage

Resilience isn’t just about preventing failures. It’s also about being able to identify and respond to problems quickly. If your network is made up of disconnected pieces of equipment that nobody is actively monitoring, finding the cause of a problem can take considerably longer.

Was it the internet connection?

The firewall?

A switch?

An access point?

A particular device?

Modern managed networking platforms provide much greater visibility across the network bringing together routing, security, switching and WiFi within a centrally managed environment.

For Xcomm, that visibility helps our team manage and support the network. For the customer, it means they don’t need to become networking experts themselves.

Proactive management can make the biggest difference

Hardware is only one part of business network resilience. How that hardware is configured, maintained and supported matters just as much.

Networks change.

New employees arrive. More devices are connected. Cloud services are introduced. Businesses move premises, open additional locations and change the way their teams work. At the same time, firmware and security updates need managing and network performance needs watching.

That’s why Xcomm provides managed networking rather than simply supplying a box and leaving you to get on with it. Our team can design the network, install and configure the equipment, monitor performance and provide ongoing support. For businesses without an internal IT department, that gives them access to networking expertise when they need it. For organisations with their own IT teams, Xcomm can provide additional specialist knowledge and support.

How resilient is your current network?

A useful starting point is to ask a few simple questions.

Do you know what would happen if your main internet connection failed?

Do you know whether your firewall is still appropriate for the size of your organisation?

Are your switches capable of handling your current and future requirements?

Does your WiFi provide reliable coverage everywhere it’s needed?

Can problems across your network be identified quickly?

And when was the network last reviewed as a complete system rather than as a collection of individual devices?

If some of those questions are difficult to answer, it may be time to take a closer look.

Build a more resilient network with Xcomm

There isn’t one perfect network design – or one networking platform – that works for every business.

The right solution depends on your people, locations, applications, devices, security requirements and plans for the future.

That’s why Xcomm works with leading networking technologies including Cisco Meraki and Ubiquiti. UniFi provides a powerful, flexible option for many business networks, while Cisco Meraki can be utilised for larger, more complex environments where additional enterprise capabilities are required.

Our job isn’t to steer every customer towards the same technology. It’s to understand what your business needs and design the right network around it.

Xcomm designs, builds and manages business networks, bringing together connectivity, firewalls, switching, wireless networking and ongoing support into a solution that works as a whole. We work with businesses of all sizes, from smaller single-site organisations through to larger, more complex multi-site environments.

Get in touch with Xcomm today to find out how our managed networking services can transform the way you work.

Or book a free network health check and let our team review your current setup, identify potential risks or bottlenecks and recommend practical next steps.

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