Ultimate Guide to

Network Management in
the Enterprise
In this guide:
This guide to network management explains the challenges of enterprise network
Ultimate guide to network monitoring and maintenance, best practices and next-generation automation using AI and
management in the
enterprise ML.

Why is network
management important?

Network management
functions

Best practices for managing

networks

Network management
challenges

Network management tools

Next-generation network
monitoring techniques

1 ULTIMATE GUIDE TO NETWORK MANAGEMENT IN THE ENTERPRISE

In this guide:

Ultimate guide to network

Ultimate guide to network management in the enterprise
management in the
enterprise CHUCK MOOZAKIS, EDITOR AT LARGE, SANDRA GITTLEN, EDITOR AT LARGE

Why is network
Network management is a cornerstone of IT that helps ensure enterprises run efficiently and
management important?
effectively end to end. Technologies such as AI and machine learning are beginning to
Network management
functions automate many of the functions of network administration and management, which
includes provisioning, security and optimization. These tools expand visibility into and
Best practices for managing
networks control of the network and its devices without increasing the burden on IT teams. At the
same time, network management has been reshaped by the impact of the COVID-19
Network management
challenges pandemic, which forced employers to find new ways to extend management oversight to
Network management tools
employees working from remote locations.

Next-generation network
monitoring techniques
In this network management guide, we dig deep into functions, techniques, best practices,
next-generation technology and more. The links embedded throughout the article lead to
even more information and provide a better understanding of the important role network
management plays in every enterprise.

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WHY IS NETWORK MANAGEMENT IMPORTANT?
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
enterprise To best illustrate the business need for a well-considered network management strategy, IT
should calculate the cost of network downtime. Network downtime affects revenue,
Why is network
management important? employee productivity, reputation damage, monetary damage and general Opex costs.

Network management
functions The monetary damage from network brownouts -- unanticipated and unplanned drops in
network quality -- averages about $600,000 per organization, according to a 2019 survey
Best practices for managing
networks from Juniper Networks Inc. Juniper later acquired network monitoring software provider
Network management
Netrounds, which conducted the original survey before the Juniper acquisition. Whether
challenges expected or unexpected, downtime incurs costs that organizations can avoid or at least
Network management tools reduce with the help of network management.

Next-generation network
monitoring techniques In the past, companies might have justified taking a lighter approach to network
management because achieving comprehensive visibility and monitoring required a large
amount of skilled staff. Network automation has eased that burden by eliminating common
labor-intensive manual network tasks, such as provisioning, scripting, implementing change
requests and identifying causes of slowdowns and outages.

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Automation also has brought about the following benefits:
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
enterprise • reductions in human errors;
• rapid provisioning of new services;
Why is network
• the ability to locate and identify the root cause of network security issues; and
management important?
• reduced security risks because fewer manual processes mean fewer configuration or
Network management policy errors that can create vulnerabilities.
functions
Network automation is just one of many concepts and terms that are important to know as
Best practices for managing
networks you deepen your understanding of network management.

Network management
challenges

Network management tools

Next-generation network
monitoring techniques

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NETWORK MANAGEMENT FUNCTIONS
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
enterprise Network management comprises five major elements: fault management, configuration
management, account management, performance management and security management
Why is network
management important? (also known as FCAPS). Network management expert Amy Larsen DeCarlo detailed each of
these elements, explaining their importance in administering and managing enterprise
Network management
functions operations.
Best practices for managing
networks To account for the efficacy of these elements, network professionals use monitoring tools
Network management
that watch the network end to end. These tools provide visibility into performance, traffic,
challenges usage, faults and availability. As expert Ed Tittel and IT writer Kim Lindros explained, "…
Network management tools careful network monitoring can facilitate proactive strategies, such as justifying the cost of
hardware or infrastructure upgrades required to eliminate chronic network bottlenecks."
Next-generation network
monitoring techniques
Network monitoring -- while available as network device logs, open source tools or
proprietary monitoring features built into network products -- often performs better as a
fully dedicated platform with a rich feature set and vendor support.

Along with network monitoring, organizations should carefully consider implementing a

network analytics tool to compile the data gathered through monitoring and generate
insightful and actionable reports. Network analytics and network monitoring tools should be

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able to span on-premises, remote, cloud or hybrid environments, as well as uniformly deal
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
with wired and wireless infrastructure.
enterprise

Why is network
Conducting a network assessment that accounts for the various network components that
management important? can gather and analyze telemetry data will be essential to pick the tools most appropriate for
Network management your corporate enterprise. For instance, some platforms focus heavily on monitoring and
functions reporting with a few out-of-the-box analytics features while others focus on deep root cause
Best practices for managing analysis and AI customization. Make sure to include IoT environments, if you have them, in
networks
your assessment.
Network management
challenges
BEST PRACTICES FOR MANAGING NETWORKS
Network management tools

Next-generation network Inventory the enterprise. Take an accurate inventory of all the devices and applications in
monitoring techniques
the network. Use tools that can discover devices automatically to spare IT the difficulty and
tediousness of this task.

Reduce manual management. Automating network management is considered a best

practice but is far too general a notion to implement wholesale. Automation should be kept
simple, low risk and quickly implementable to start. For instance, network teams can
automate device locators to find out where a device connects to the network, perform
application connectivity checks, verify each network infrastructure device is properly

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connected to its neighbor, and find discrepancies between parts of network configurations
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
and the organization's configuration templates. As teams achieve success with this low-
enterprise hanging fruit, they can move up to automating intermediate and advanced tasks, which
Why is network include verifying Border Gateway Protocol connectivity and automating access control list
management important? updates.
Network management
functions

Best practices for managing

networks

Network management
challenges

Network management tools

Next-generation network
monitoring techniques

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Evaluate the scope and risk of changes. Even the network change management process is
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
driven by best practices, which reduce the risk of a failed change. Applying some basic
enterprise operating principles, such as evaluating the scope of a proposed change, will prevent
Why is network possible missteps down the road.
management important?

Network management Some questions include the following:

functions

Best practices for managing • What are the number of endpoints affected by the change?
networks • What is the importance of the services a change might affect?

Network management Evaluation of the scope should be accompanied by a risk analysis. After that, network teams
challenges
should put the change through a peer review, pre-deployment testing and validation,
Network management tools implementation and testing, and documentation and network management updates.
Next-generation network Make processes, including troubleshooting, repeatable through documentation.
monitoring techniques
Documentation is useful in most areas of network management, especially when trying to
troubleshoot issues with wired and wireless connectivity. For instance, how IT approaches
identifying and resolving wireless network connectivity problems should be documented and
repeatable to save time and avoid misconfigurations.

TechTarget contributor Lee Badman offered 10 steps to troubleshooting wireless network

connection problems that take readers from basic problems, such as making sure the correct
Wi-Fi access point is selected, to more advanced client issues.

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NETWORK MANAGEMENT CHALLENGES
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
enterprise Even with best practices in place, network management can pose challenges for enterprises.

Why is network
management important? Legacy networks. If an organization is relying on
cumbersome legacy monitoring tools, then managing
Network management
functions disparate environments -- including virtual and cloud-
based networks -- could prove difficult. Legacy tools also
Best practices for managing
networks can impede efforts to gain end-to-end visibility.
Network management
challenges Complexity and abstraction. Modern technologies also

Network management tools

have their challenges as they add to the complexity of
network environments. For example, in virtualized
Next-generation network
monitoring techniques environments, end-to-end visibility can be complicated
by reporting gaps that can result when traditional
network monitoring tools are used to track the
hypervisors used to manage virtual machines.

Overlay networks are similarly problematic, as they can obscure underlying hardware and
software from monitoring tools.

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Interconnectivity. Even as multi-cloud environments gain interest, the bridges that connect
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
these environments are causing provisioning headaches, performance inconsistencies and
enterprise security blind spots that network professionals are left to resolve. This makes applying sound
Why is network network management principles a difficult endeavor.
management important?

Network management
NETWORK MANAGEMENT TOOLS
functions

Best practices for managing Network management vendors are spending a great deal of time trying to reduce the
networks
complexity and increase the interoperability and feature sets of their products. Even so,
Network management
most companies still use multiple network management tools for various products and
challenges
devices, which only adds to the complexity. Below are some examples of progress being
Network management tools
made with network management interoperability.
Next-generation network
monitoring techniques
Integrated network monitoring and security

Integrating network management and monitoring with security tools to distill more
comprehensive security insights provides incredible value to businesses. With this capability,
network managers can play a larger role in addressing security risks, and they will be able to
share important information with security teams.

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Integrating network management security can also be beneficial when it comes to the labor-
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
intensive task of running security audits. IT teams can automatically verify configurations and
enterprise standards across devices and relay the results more efficiently.
Why is network
management important? As-a-service network monitoring
Network management Vendors also are concentrating on how to help network teams monitor cloud environment
functions
performance, especially SaaS, PaaS and IaaS. In terms of SaaS monitoring, network teams
Best practices for managing
networks
must find a tool that lets them monitor the end user's path from the internet service
provider to the public cloud to measure service latency, DNS speed and accessibility, and
Network management
challenges content delivery network responsiveness from an end-user perspective.

Network management tools

Check out how network performance monitoring tools have evolved to account for as-a-
Next-generation network service environments.
monitoring techniques

Hybrid cloud monitoring

Cloud providers often help businesses monitor within their own environment only, but a
new crop of network monitoring tools is emerging to satisfy the multi-cloud monitoring
need. Hybrid cloud monitoring platforms use a passive network appliance to capture traffic
data across the entire hybrid cloud environment. Along with analytics capabilities, they can
identify a potential break before it causes significant problems.

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Ultimate guide to network

management in the
enterprise

Why is network
management important?

Network management
functions

Best practices for managing

networks

Network management
challenges

Network management tools

Next-generation network
monitoring techniques

Open source network monitoring

For companies on tighter budgets but still under pressure to meet service-level agreement
demands, open source network monitoring is an attractive and cost-effective choice. The

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industry's most skilled developers have collaborated on these offerings, which have
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
undergone rigorous peer and user review.
enterprise

Why is network
Open source tools also can help organizations avoid the increasing licensing costs that arise
management important? from adding more components that need monitoring. With open source tools, enterprises
Network management can expand the environment they need to manage, including servers and switches, without
functions breaking the budget on licensing and support contracts.
Best practices for managing
networks Configuration management
Network management
challenges
Configuration management improves network maintenance and helps keep track of
connected devices, device configurations and device connections. With configuration
Network management tools
management, network teams can achieve three goals: maintain accurate configuration
Next-generation network records, enable efficient network scans and enable network automation capabilities.
monitoring techniques

Automated network testing

Automated network testing can supplement network management tools, verifying physical
connectivity, routing protocol functionality, path performance and more. However, the same
problems that can plague network management around abstraction, virtualization and
overlays apply to automated network testing.

Network automation tools come in three varieties:

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• tools that were primarily built for server and application automation but have expanded to
Ultimate guide to network include the network;
management in the
enterprise
• tools that are purpose-built for the network; and
• software-defined platforms that create a software overlay across LAN hardware.
Why is network
management important? All of these bring features and capabilities to the table that eliminate manual, error-prone
Network management tasks such as configuration backups, tool access control, compliance monitoring and
functions verification, vulnerability assessments and network orchestration. Read more from Andrew
Best practices for managing Froehlich to explore the leading network automation tools.
networks
Soon, network professionals will be looking to combine network automation tools to create
Network management an end-to-end service to aid in design, implementation and testing.
challenges

Network management tools

NEXT-GENERATION NETWORK MONITORING TECHNIQUES
Next-generation network
monitoring techniques
One of the most promising technologies for network management is intent-based
networking. Intent-based networks use automation and orchestration to change how
network configurations are deployed. The goal is to have self-managing, self-healing
networks that draw on AI and machine learning to carry out network tasks.

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Ultimate guide to network

management in the
enterprise

Why is network
management important?

Network management
functions

Best practices for managing

networks

Network management
challenges

Network management tools

Next-generation network
monitoring techniques

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Admittedly, IT teams are wary of this level of automation, fearing it will make them far too
Ultimate guide to network
management in the
removed from day-to-day operations. As organizations hire network professionals, they
enterprise should ensure candidates are comfortable ceding some control to emerging automation and
Why is network intelligence tools to better implement automation adoption in the enterprise.
management important?

Network management On the security front, AI and machine learning will help network teams discern dangerous
functions activity from harmless anomalies by recognizing disruptive traffic patterns that diverge from
Best practices for managing normal activity. This becomes especially important in IoT environments.
networks

Network management AI and machine learning also will improve network operations, enabling analytics
challenges applications to discover the root cause of an issue and automatically implement the correct
Network management tools fix.
Next-generation network
monitoring techniques One of the biggest wins to come from AI and machine learning is a significant drop in the
volume of events IT staff members must handle each day, potentially decreasing from
millions and thousands to just a few critical ones.

Network management is evolving quickly as advanced technologies are built into them,
leaving IT teams to become more strategic in how they administer and manage their next-
generation networks.

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