Having completed all of the previous strategy elements, you are ready to deploy. Is that all there is to it? Not quite. In this post, I'll highlight strategies you can use for a smooth post-deployment.
Change Management
In one of my past experiences, deployment of our branch routers went off without a hitch and we patted ourselves on the back and went home. In the morning, operations noted a reload on two of the routers we had upgraded the night before. It appeared that one of the defects we evaluated had not discovered "all" of the traffic that could force the reload. So what was the impact of all this? As part of our change management strategy, we were certain to ensure that we could back out on our changes. Additionally, we set the device to load the old software and configuration if the device reloaded. This resulted in less than a minute outage for those devices that did reload and the design allowed for seamless failover between the two switches. Failure to do so would have resulted in the router continuously reloading as these packets were encountered -, which would unlikely be noticed. It is important to note that there was no impact on the production network or business services.
To implement effective change management at your company, you must initiate process and leverage tooling to automate where possible. It's not really feasible to update 1,100 devices with a "no ip http-server" command to resolve a security advisory or deploy a new software image to 1,100 closet switches -manually. The best planning is of little use if it cannot be implemented. Once validation has been completed, you are left with two specific areas that need to be addressed:
Network Management
Once you have executed all strategies and successfully deployed your changes to the network, you need to be able to monitor to ensure that the network is performing correctly. This is the ultimate validation of the changes and can also preemptively identify where adjustments or changes to need to be applied. It is a best practice to capture CPU, Memory and other KPI's from a device both pre and post change to validate that the device is performing as expected post change. Every company should develop an overall network management architecture and design that captures the relevant metrics and KPI's need to measure their business services.
In summary, to get the most ROI from your network and effectively implement change, it requires a holistic approach. I've outlined the strategies developed by Cisco Services including design, hardware, software, change management and network management. The Network Optimization Service (NOS) can help you implement these strategies with dedicated engineers that use these best practices and the latest smart tools to support and guide your team. To learn more, view this video or contact your account manager to see how this service can help you achieve your goals.
Now I'd like to hear from you, what's been your experience? How do you prepare for changes to your network ?