An enormous amount of people now use a computer for work - and a large percentage of these depend on networks. They can be fast, or they can be slow, but when they are necessary, and aren't working as they usually do, they make a big impact on a business bottom line. Here we look at exactly what network performance management frustration means for businesses, and some of the best ways to address it.
According to a recent study, some of the media that information technology infrastructure users would most like to access, but also cause a great deal of frustration with unreliability and low speed, include e-commerce applications, video content, podcast content, recruitment services and online banking.
It is recognized by information technology consultants and network performance monitors that these media have great potential to save businesses money - yet network performance management may prevent it. For example, e-commerce can save thousands in overheads for businesses - but if it is unreliable due to network constraints, it is near worthless.
However, it is not only these less common applications that information technology consultants find frustrate end users of networks. More than half of IT users say that their computers crash when they are connected to networks, or else runs slowly.
A slow-running computer is money draining away from bank accounts in lost productivity, as employees are basically sitting, being paid to do nothing.
The study on network performance management frustration recently conducted also brought some serious figures to light, suggesting that networks are more of a problem for information technology consultants than may be realized.
On average, while most users report slightly better performance when connected to their company's network as compared to the internet, around one in three respondents report that their computer runs slowly or crashes when connected to both the internet and the corporate network. Since the vast majority of users access the Internet through work computers on day-to-day basis, both for work and personal reasons, up to 30% of people in general will suffer severe performance problems.
Unfortunately for these employees suffering severe network performance frustration, many IT department managers feel that their corporate network performance management is optimal. This suggests that perhaps network performance monitoring is not as frequent or as accurate as it could be - or that their IT consulting firm or department doesn't provide it.
Two thirds of IT managers were happy, however up to 20% were very to severely disappointed with the network's performance. The primary complaints from users related to slow-running software, with system crashes and restriction of access to Internet resources also a frustration. For IT managers, system crashes were rated as the worst frustration with regard to network performance management.
One of the most telling areas of the study, pointing to a real need for better network performance monitoring, and network performance management, is that which asked respondents to measure delays in seconds of various applications. File transfers, networked account log-ins, special applications and rich-internet applications caused some considerable delays, nearly a minute in some cases.
Over the course of a month, average users spent up to two hours simply waiting for their computers. Businesses that can multiply this over dozens or hundreds of users will immediately recognize the impact.
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