Chartered Management Institute
How we helped the UK’s oldest management training organisation to revitalise their network with WiFi 6
The Chartered Management Institute delivers management training to businesses and educational institutions across the UK. Founded in 1947 and backed by a Royal Charter since 2002, CMI is the only organisation that can award Chartered Manager status through its highly regarded accreditation solutions. Along with businesses, CMI also delivers tailored training to the UK’s Armed Forces and Police.
Our network had for a long time been an area of concern for the business, however from my first engagement with Haptic I was very impressed. Our Account Manager Kenya rapidly understood our situation, we were able to agree on a logical project process with Haptic's Technical team, and I was presented with a comprehensive and validated proposal that was sensitive to our needs.
When it came to the install, Haptic’s engineering team were conscientious, tidy and flexible in working around our operations. We were kept updated around the team's progress, and at switchover the Haptic Technical team provided a detailed handover, ensuring we were comfortable with monitoring and day to day management.
Since deployment we've found that WiFi simply isn’t talked about internally; it just works! Staff now have confidence in the WiFi, and this has enabled a far more dynamic working environment, with staff moving freely across our sites and using breakout spaces for collaboration.
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As always, our approach with CMI was very open and consultative, beginning with an audit of CMI’s offices to comprehensively document the current state of their infrastructure. Our investigations established a number of areas which required improvement.
At the time, CMI were utilising outdated Ubiquiti infrastructure that was simply unable to cope with the demands of their workforce. Company-wide internal events would lead to network outages, and in addition, the lack of capable high-speed fibre links from edge to core - as well as poor quality Cat5 cabling - created additional bottlenecks that were hampering CMI’s overall connectivity.
Following our audit of CMI’s infrastructure, our consultants produced a validated network design based on real-world testing data. This design was sympathetic to their environment; we were sensitive to the fact that aesthetics were key to organisation, and in addition, asbestos had been detected in CMI’s Corby building which required extra care to work around this.
Our design also took into account budgetary constraints that had been expressed by CMI; while the client was conscious that they needed to implement a suitable solution, they were also keen to ensure their investment would be future-proofed, acting as a building block for future development.
So with this in mind, our design included the latest Cambium Networks’ high-spec WiFi 6 Access Points, Multigigabit switches, and a full overhaul of cabling connectivity, bringing this up to the Cat6a standard. Direct fibre links from network edge-to-core were also implemented, and as we were sensitive to the mission-critical nature of this solution, cabling switchover was completed out of hours to minimise network downtime.
Following the installation works, we conducted comprehensive system validation testing and knowledge handover of the solution to CMI’s networking team. We also onboarded the client into Haptic’s ongoing managed service support programme; so while CMI’s in-house IT resources retain control of their environment, they have the additional peace of mind that our team are on hand to support them with our collaborative approach.
