What Can You Do To Ensure A Stable And Fast Internet Connection For Your Office Workers?

The network engineer of a company has one basic yet very important task to complete – he or she has to ensure that the office workers have a fast and stable connection to the internet. Implementing restrictions and limits may be a daunting task but it does not sound as scary as it seems! Here are some measures that an infrastructure engineer can do to ensure that the office staffs receive a stable and speedy connection.

Set speed limits

Setting speed limits for devices and machines ensures that a single individual does not hog up all of the bandwidth. For instance, if an office of 100 staff has access to a 1GBps connection, it would be wise to set a speed limit of 8MBps to each staff. The other 200MBps can be reserved for future allocation. This way, every staff receives an equal amount of speed which is fair for everyone!

Implement website and program restrictions

Video streaming websites consume a huge amount of bandwidth which leaves fellow office colleagues with a slower internet speed. Office workers should not be looking at videos of cats during work and the network engineer can implement website and program restrictions! For instance, they can block access to video-sharing websites so that bandwidth can be used for office matters only.

Have Quality of Service implementation

Sales associates may decide to engage in a video conference with another sales associate from another country. Video conferences require a significant amount of bandwidth and the stream may lag and stutter if the internet speed is slow. The systems and network administrator can implement Quality of Service in the network. For instance, more bandwidth can be allocated to resource-intensive tasks such as video conferencing, while less bandwidth can be allocated to simple tasks such as fetching mail.

Have a plan to upgrade when the need arises

Companies steadily increase in manpower and this result in an increase usage of network bandwidth. As time passes, the current network system will struggle under the increased load and users may experience slow speeds. It is important to have a plan to upgrade when the need arises, so that users can always experience acceptable speeds and a good network connection.

For example, upgrade from a 1GBps network link to a 2GBps network link if there will be an increase of 100 new staff within the next month. Take the chance to also replace aging network components with newer ones. Newer network components are more stable and require less maintenance! Network engineers can also upgrade 2.4GHz routers to dual band 5GHz routers for faster connectivity and less interference from kitchen equipment such as microwaves.

Adhere to best practices

Network engineers should always adhere to best practices. For example, they should have a good network design and implementation plan in place, so that users of the network will experience a stable and strong internet connection wherever they go. Access points should overlap each other so that users can move from one place to another without losing internet connectivity. The number of access points in an area should depend on the maximum number of possible users. For example, 1 access point is needed for a room that contains 20 people, whereas 10 access points is needed for an auditorium that holds up to 250 people.