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If your employees will be working from home for the foreseeable future, implementing a Wi-Fi monitoring strategy achieves consistent uptime and productivity
As remote workforces become more common during the COVID-19 pandemic, an entirely new set of challenges arise for IT departments attempting to keep their company's employees on track.
That's because very few workers will have their home networks set up to efficiently handle certain enterprise application requirements. Accordingly, IT departments are sure to field numerous troubleshooting calls when the technology doesn't work at home as it does in the office.
Wi-Fi connection problems are also issues when working at home because residential internet is typically slower than business internet and home networks are more prone to connection difficulties.
Using the right Wi-Fi monitoring application ensures that your network team can keep an eye on your employees' networks. This information helps the IT department identify problems and provide solutions as they arise—or even beforehand—to achieve business continuity.
A recent study by Stanford University suggests that only 26% of American employees are currently working on-site, so these remote-work challenges aren’t going away anytime soon.
Here's what you should know about home Wi-Fi problems and how a network monitoring platform can keep your employees performing at optimal levels.
Why employees have Wi-Fi problems at home
An office network is designed to run all of the applications a company requires on a day-to-day basis. This set-up is also optimized for the specific work environment, and IT departments can quickly troubleshoot issues to keep everything running.
Home Wi-Fi networks don't have the same optimization level—so employees are far more likely to experience problems while trying to connect and run necessary applications. Any slowdowns can lead to continuity issues—such as when the team is waiting on data from one member to continue a project, but that individual is having internet problems.
Interference from devices inside the home or apartment building can commonly cause Wi-Fi issues for home users. Residences have multiple devices operating on the same or different frequencies, which can interfere with data transmission and slow a connection.
Employees who don't have a dedicated workspace in their homes and move throughout the residence may experience roaming problems. The further the worker gets from the router or as the individual moves around, the more likely the disruption. An incredibly common Wi-Fi challenge in a residential environment is coverage, often caused by hiding the router behind a shelf or in a closet, limiting the signal's strength.
Congestion can also arise on a home network, mainly when multiple people connect to a router at once. If an employee has a spouse who is also working from home or kids streaming a television show, the network can get congested.
Finally, an issue could arise from the equipment or services. Most individuals won't have the same state-of-the-art technology or business-speed internet at home. Consequently, their computers might not be capable of running the necessary enterprise applications, or their Wi-Fi might not have the speeds needed.
While many things could limit your off-site employees from functioning optimally, network engineers can offer solutions to most of these problems—if they can effectively monitor these remote networks and provide troubleshooting advice.
How a wireless network monitoring platform helps
Every employee within your organization will have a different home network set-up. As a result, it can be incredibly difficult for your IT team to manage, optimize, and address every network—but there is a solution.
By installing a wireless network monitoring (WNM) application directly on your employees' operating systems, your network engineers will have access to tons of information that helps them identify issues and offer solutions. 7SIGNAL’s Mobile Eye is the best-in-class remote WNM platform.
The platform has a dashboard that alerts network engineers of potential or current issues, allowing them to proactively address the problems before they hinder continuity. End-users can expect a 50-100% improvement in their baseline network performance. Furthermore, IT departments can reduce the time they spend troubleshooting by 80-90%.
Organizations also lower their risks of service disruption, and they reduce operational costs by using this application.
Your network team will know why your workers are having problems running enterprise applications and can offer solutions. When no immediate resolutions are available, you'll know that equipment or service upgrades are necessary to maintain continuity.
Keeping your workforce on track
Setting up a home-based workforce is full of challenges and isn't something you should expect to happen without issues. By allowing your IT team to monitor your remote employees' Wi-Fi connections, you can identify and eliminate some of the most pressing challenges you'll encounter.
7SIGNAL's Mobile Eye is the solution. This technology is a massive help as you look to adapt to a work-from-home model during COVID-19. Contact us for more information on how our platform can help your organization.
7SIGNAL® is a leader in enterprise wireless experience monitoring. 7SIGNAL provides a cloud-based platform that continuously monitors wireless networks and identifies elusive performance issues impacting application performance and digital experience. By taking the “outside-in” approach to monitoring 7SIGNAL has visibility into the edge of any enterprise or home Wi-Fi network where complex device interaction exists, and user experience matters most. The platform maximizes employee productivity, operational efficiency and network ROI. Sapphire Eye® and Mobile Eye® are designed for and deployed at the world’s most innovative organizations, educational institutions, healthcare systems and government agencies. Learn more at www.7signal.com.