The Three Levels of Fiber Network Management Maturity

The law of fiber record entropy

Fiber optic network management is subject to the second law of thermodynamics. In plain terms, this law describes the tendency for the universe to move towards chaos rather than order. “Entropy” in this context represents the amount of disorder that exists in a given system.

Although entropy is a thermodynamic concept, the same principle holds true for virtually any system. To give an example, think about keeping a home clean. It only gets dirtier and messier unless someone intervenes and cleans on a regular basis. Fiber networks are the same way. The entropy of fiber network documentation only increases as time goes on without intervention.

The consequences of entropy

The more entropy in a fiber network, the harder it becomes to optimize operations without a reliable system of record (SoR). Details start to fall through the cracks and workflow inefficiencies are compounded, creating operational issues that multiply with time.

For example, without an SoR, operators have less control and insight into crucial network details. As a result, field technicians are less productive, downtimes are longer, and companies spend more money than necessary to deliver services to subscribers. The result is frustrated field teams and unhappy customers.

Many operators also rush into the construction phase and begin fiber-rollout journeys with an “I hope nothing bad happens” management strategy. They rely on faith to keep subscribers satisfied and hope that the cost of adding new customers is less than anticipated revenues. Without an accurate view of the network, this approach may be their only option.

Consequently, these operators can’t commit to meaningful performance benchmarks in service level agreement (SLA) negotiations. They have little confidence or knowledge regarding the details of their networks, preventing them from meeting end-user expectations.

Furthermore, operators often postpone implementing third-party productivity tools or solutions. Yet, this is almost always a false economy. Failing to intervene and take action against entropy yields serious consequences that only escalate with time, compromising the performance and success of the business.

Keeping entropy at bay

So, what is the most effective way to intervene and combat entropy?

One option is to hire dedicated resources to support fiber documentation. Fiber operators can assign employees to spend more time gathering network data and managing databases. However, there are several problems with this approach.

One, it doesn’t scale. Two, it leads to documentation inconsistencies, as there is no rules-basis for the work that gets done by individual team members. Three, it doesn’t solve the tribal knowledge problem - the reality that fiber documentation often “lives” only in the heads of individual employees who don’t have an effective way to transfer wisdom to a permanent database. Systemic tribal knowledge creates huge risk for fiber operators and is only becoming more relevant as the fiber workforce ages and staffing numbers decline.

The only real solution is to deploy a software-based SoR within a broader fiber management ecosystem that addresses the challenges of fiber documentation. An SoR can store and provide all the information needed to make informed decisions, as well as enable workers to collaborate remotely to keep fiber records organized using a systematic rules-based methodology.

Without an SoR, field technicians and office workers can’t effectively problem-solve today, much less plan for the future. They can’t trust in the integrity of network data and are forced to spend significant time and effort to manually sift through poorly formatted records. For these reasons, SoRs in isolation still leaves opportunity on the table.

Fiber operators need to implement specific workflows and automation around their SoRs to reach their full fiber management potential, aka Level 3 Maturity. Otherwise, they risk staying in Level 1 or Level 2, or even falling down a level, as entropy acts on the network.