Why Most Network Consultants Arent Worth Their Fees
| Category: Website Design and Development | Date: 2003-10-05 |
If youre currently employing a consultant to guide you in managing your network operations, or if youre considering a consultant, there are some things you need to consider.
While most consultants are reputable and reliable, this may not mean that theyre worth, to you, the amount of money youre paying them. Why? Because theyre only worth their fees if what theyre doing is what you need done, and this is often not the case.
The reason for this is that network consultants come in, evaluate your network, and make recommendations. Theyre not on-site for a long period of time and they have no history with your network. Thus, their recommendations are "standard" recommendations based on what should be, not necessarily what "is."
A network consultant has no real data about your network. He has data hes generated during his (usually quite brief) stay at your site, and he has data hes accumulated over his years as a network consultant. Its this accumulated data which the consultant relies on the most, and the fact is, this data has very little to do with the actual functioning of *your* network.
Its like if someone comes in, watches your five-year-old sitting on the couch watching TV quietly for half an hour, diagnoses the child as under-active and prescribes two hours of outside play every day for the next month, to increase your childs activity level. What the consultant doesnt know, and wasnt able to find out, is that your child had just come in from two hours of chasing his dog in the field outside your home, and he was exhausted. Only someone familiar with your child would notice that this was abnormal behavior.
On a slightly lighter note, if you are or were a big fan of Gilligans Island, you may remember the episode where he gorged on bananas, and turned down a banana cream pie Mary Ann had made for him. The castaways became convinced he was sick. In fact, he was simply full.
This is one reason a consultant has difficulty really helping you manage your network operations-he simply doesnt have the knowledge about your network to make the right decisions.
Along these same lines, your consultant has no history of "exceptions" to predict future problems. In other words, if your child sometimes runs a fever of 102, and this usually indicates an ear infection, this is a "history of exceptions" in your child-you know that she sometimes has ear infections, that a fever is the first symptom, and thus when your child has a fever, you take her to the doctor to get her ears checked. If your network has common exceptions that indicate particular problems, but your consultant is not aware of these exceptions, he has no way of predicting future problems and how to avoid them. This is where the history of experience with the network comes in, and theres simply no way a consultant can know this.
A third deficiency in consultants is that, just as they have no history on which to base predictions of future problems, they have no performance trends on which to base future needs for the network in terms of maintenance, upgrades, and the like. They dont know what is "normal" for your network, in other words. Theyre very familiar with networks *like* yours, but this does not necessarily make them familiar with your particular network, with its various idiosyncrasies and its own way of functioning. What is best for "most networks" might bring yours to its knees, and a consultant, on a short visit, has no way of knowing this.
So, if a consultant is not the solution, what is? A system of network "baselining," of determining, over a period of time, how the network behaves, what exceptions occur and why, and what is "normal" for your particular network. All the consultants and monitoring software in the world cant make your network more efficient and effective if you dont know whats normal for your network.
About the Author
A.D. Dixon is a freelance writer and consultant. For more information on network baselining see http://www.ilan.com/ Contact Tom Reynolds at reynolds@ilan.com for more info on iLan Systems and NetEquality Baselining
This article provided by the InfoZone Archives at: http://www.MakingProfit.com
add@hotpop.com
http://www.ilan.com
While most consultants are reputable and reliable, this may not mean that theyre worth, to you, the amount of money youre paying them. Why? Because theyre only worth their fees if what theyre doing is what you need done, and this is often not the case.
The reason for this is that network consultants come in, evaluate your network, and make recommendations. Theyre not on-site for a long period of time and they have no history with your network. Thus, their recommendations are "standard" recommendations based on what should be, not necessarily what "is."
A network consultant has no real data about your network. He has data hes generated during his (usually quite brief) stay at your site, and he has data hes accumulated over his years as a network consultant. Its this accumulated data which the consultant relies on the most, and the fact is, this data has very little to do with the actual functioning of *your* network.
Its like if someone comes in, watches your five-year-old sitting on the couch watching TV quietly for half an hour, diagnoses the child as under-active and prescribes two hours of outside play every day for the next month, to increase your childs activity level. What the consultant doesnt know, and wasnt able to find out, is that your child had just come in from two hours of chasing his dog in the field outside your home, and he was exhausted. Only someone familiar with your child would notice that this was abnormal behavior.
On a slightly lighter note, if you are or were a big fan of Gilligans Island, you may remember the episode where he gorged on bananas, and turned down a banana cream pie Mary Ann had made for him. The castaways became convinced he was sick. In fact, he was simply full.
This is one reason a consultant has difficulty really helping you manage your network operations-he simply doesnt have the knowledge about your network to make the right decisions.
Along these same lines, your consultant has no history of "exceptions" to predict future problems. In other words, if your child sometimes runs a fever of 102, and this usually indicates an ear infection, this is a "history of exceptions" in your child-you know that she sometimes has ear infections, that a fever is the first symptom, and thus when your child has a fever, you take her to the doctor to get her ears checked. If your network has common exceptions that indicate particular problems, but your consultant is not aware of these exceptions, he has no way of predicting future problems and how to avoid them. This is where the history of experience with the network comes in, and theres simply no way a consultant can know this.
A third deficiency in consultants is that, just as they have no history on which to base predictions of future problems, they have no performance trends on which to base future needs for the network in terms of maintenance, upgrades, and the like. They dont know what is "normal" for your network, in other words. Theyre very familiar with networks *like* yours, but this does not necessarily make them familiar with your particular network, with its various idiosyncrasies and its own way of functioning. What is best for "most networks" might bring yours to its knees, and a consultant, on a short visit, has no way of knowing this.
So, if a consultant is not the solution, what is? A system of network "baselining," of determining, over a period of time, how the network behaves, what exceptions occur and why, and what is "normal" for your particular network. All the consultants and monitoring software in the world cant make your network more efficient and effective if you dont know whats normal for your network.
About the Author
A.D. Dixon is a freelance writer and consultant. For more information on network baselining see http://www.ilan.com/ Contact Tom Reynolds at reynolds@ilan.com for more info on iLan Systems and NetEquality Baselining
This article provided by the InfoZone Archives at: http://www.MakingProfit.com
add@hotpop.com
http://www.ilan.com
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