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How CSPs can Rethink Network
Optimisation in the Age of Complexity

By: Martin Saunders

CSPs are having to integrate a broad spectrum of technologies - from legacy infrastructure to virtualised systems and cloud-native applications. This is leading to an increasingly complex environment that often obscures how individual services are performing and makes efficient management a growing challenge. 

This article explores how a hybrid approach to network evolution, while necessary, has created new blind spots in operational visibility. With multiple systems operating side-by-side, first-line support teams frequently struggle with inconsistent user interfaces and fragmented performance data. 

But there's a solution gaining traction: unified network observability through a single, centralised portal that can be shared across both a provider and their customers to deliver significant benefits to both.  

End-to-end visibility across an organisation’s entire infrastructure can lead to streamlined support workflows, faster incident resolution, improved service performance analysis and data-driven decision-making at the executive level. 

Streamlined support workflows

CSPs frequently begin by offering customers a unified view of their network’s performance, often as part of a broader managed service package. Over time, many CSPs soon discover that adopting this same technology internally can significantly enhance their own support workflows and operational efficiency. 

A common scenario is when a user experiences degraded performance during a business-critical task such as participating in a Microsoft Teams video call.  The user depends on their provider for everything, such as hosted telephony, conferencing and collaboration services, all applications that place heavy demands on network quality. 

When performance issues occur, the cause is not always immediately clear. Users rarely know whether the problem stems from their device, their local network or the service itself. This lack of visibility leads to a reactive support cycle, user frustration and a surge of support tickets. 

Unified network observability transforms this situation by delivering real-time, actionable insights into both network and service performance. It enables users and local support teams alike to perform quick, informed diagnostics without needing specialised expertise. So rather than default to escalation, users such as a branch manager can consult straightforward dashboards or follow guided troubleshooting steps to help pinpoint the problem. They might discover, for example, that local Wi-Fi interference or a disconnected webcam is the real issue, or conversely, confirm that the broader network or service is at fault. 

This approach offers two advantages. First, it significantly reduces the number of support tickets generated. Second, when a problem does need escalation, both the customer and the CSP’s support team have access to the same transparent data. This shared visibility minimises back-and-forth communication, speeds up resolution and reduces blame-shifting between network and application teams.

Faster incident resolution

With unified network observability in place, both the customer’s IT team and the CSP benefit. The provider receives support tickets that are already backed with actionable data, eliminating the need to repeat diagnostic steps. Most importantly, with both sides working from the same source of truth, there’s no ambiguity about whether an issue is real or where it lies within the infrastructure. The CSP can save time and avoid the inefficiencies of repeated troubleshooting or blame-shifting between network and application layers. 

Another important advantage is that the information presented through an observability platform is accessible and understandable to non-technical staff. Support teams can interpret the simple metrics and status indicators themselves, reducing their reliance on highly specialised network engineers. Instead, first-line support teams can handle initial issues with people who excel in communication, empathy and customer service skills. This makes it easier to build responsive support teams without the constant challenge of hiring certified network engineers for every role. 

Improved service performance analysis

Network observability plays a critical role in enhancing service performance analysis. At the end of each month or quarter, report production for service reviews can be prepared in a fraction of the time.  And the shared dashboards with a clear account of how the network and services have performed foster a far more conversational



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