Intelligent CIO Middle East Issue 44 | Page 41

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// or is deemed as low tech, when in fact it is essential in many critical situations; air traffic control, hospitals, traffic lights, communication. . . . What happens when they go wrong? Industry needs to recognise network cabling infrastructure as the fourth utility and give it the importance it deserves. There should be tighter regulation to help increase quality of service, be more professional generally and allow customers to feel more confident and trust the quality of the installation. This is in addition to helping to safeguard the industry, making it more attractive for new talent; after all we are in competition with other industries to attract good people. www.intelligentcio.com FEATURE: TRAINING What are the potential implications of this? If the network cable infrastructure is not installed correctly and it goes wrong it is hugely costly and inconvenient – you only need to read the press about the impact of cancelled flights, accessibility to online apps, lock outs on government systems, the list goes on. . . . This is without considering any legal implications that could occur, increasing costs even more and absorbing valuable time. Sure, not all outages are caused by the network infrastructure failure as human error comes into it too; however, it does highlight several gaps that could be filled relatively easily with regulation/certification. Andrew Stevens, President and CEO, CNet Training INTELLIGENTCIO 41