Get to Know Your Computer Network

As a business owner, knowing the intricacies of your entire computer network doesn't seem realistic. But there are a few things you absolutely need to know in order to control your business costs, address risk and reduce downtime.

How Well You Need to Know Your Network

Discovering which elements of your network you need to understand is, like everything else about your business, a matter of assessing your goals. If you don't care about compliance or reputation, you might not want to know anything at all, for example. But chances are these big ticket items are important to you — and if so, here's what you need to focus on:

1. You need to know if you're compliant

Despite all the work your IT team puts into this, for you, this is a straightforward yes or no item. Conduct an audit or hire a partner to conduct an audit to give you the green light or the red light. If you're not compliant with financial, health and security regulations, your business is at unnecessary risk.

2. You need to know if your network is secure

Get a report that outlines the basic facets of network security, like whether or not you have backups and how much time it may take to restore your data in the case of a breach (so you can better discuss this with customers and your supply chain, and avoid surprises).

"You need to know if your network is giving you a good reason to reassure your customers that they can trust you," says Alex Insley, Twinstate's Unified Defense Strategies manager. "Do you feel good about saying they can trust you? You need to be able to."

That means you need information about whether or not all resources are running and completely patched (to standards) and that notifications are being sent to the right people in every event.

Imagine, though, if you had to look through all of your firewall logs. It would be extremely time consuming and likely wouldn't produce actionable insights. But you still need to know that someone or something is bringing all of these aspects of network security to your attention, Insley notes, either on an ad hoc or regular basis.

An additional benefit to having access to pertinent security information like this, Insley says, is that whoever monitors your network won't always be giving you green lights. That might not sound like a benefit, but it's truly reassuring for you to know that your network or business could take a tumble and still get back up.

3. You need to know what you don't know — and who can tell you

To keep your business running, you need to pay attention to other priorities. That's why you need to know that there are things you likely can't know at all times — but someone can.

Find that person. "You need to find someone you trust to tell you that everything is OK," says Insley. "You need that person to be informed and honest."

Trusting your compliance risk and the security of your network to an individual or group of individuals is somewhat frightening. After all, despite the tumble/get back up reassurance you may gain from a report, your security and your reputation are still major assets to your company. That's why you need to find the right person or partner.

"You have to be able to ask them to listen, and trust that they'll only bring you the important information," says Insley. Ultimately, the amount of downtime any business can afford is becoming less and less, and knowing that your network is in the hands of an honest professional who can help you manage a breach is of paramount importance.

The Most Important Thing to Know About Your Network

Your network is complicated. Patch levels, defunct workstations, entry points and exit points, firewall strength ... the list goes on. But there's only one thing that stands out as the absolute most important thing to know about your network at all times, and it's the common thread between every item on this list.

What you really need to know about your network is that there's someone you trust monitoring it.