WWT Research • Priorities Report •

Networking Priorities for 2023

A roadmap for delivering organization-wide connectivity.

Networking gets back in the driver's seat

 Re-examining connectivity as organizations acclimate to change 

Never have traffic flows and end-user behaviors changed as rapidly as they did during the past few years. In 2020, networking leaders scrambled to enable remote work. In 2021, they responded to offices reopening. In 2022, they adapted to hybrid work. 

During the same time, we saw the rise of new architectures and means of connectivity that have broken serious ground. Secure access service edge (SASE) has evolved from an initially confounding market term into solutions that are now being deployed at scale. Private LTE has evolved from a generic concept into a solution with fully baked enterprise use cases. And finally, Wi-Fi 6E is ready for prime time, giving networking leaders even more options to handle bandwidth-intensive traffic. 

In our 2022 Networking Priorities Report, we covered these areas to help you develop a basic understanding. It was important to keep up with these technology shifts but not necessarily time to act. For 2023, our outlook is quite different. 

This is primarily driven by the fact that hybrid work is here. While there's certainly a lot to optimize, we believe that organizations have enough of a pulse on end-user behavior and traffic flows to make networking investments in line with employee experience.

We see 2023 as a year marked by acclimation rather than response. A year in which networking leaders can take a breath and get back to driving their organizations' multi-year initiatives.

In this report, we've identified four priorities where we feel networking leaders can make tangible gains by the end of 2023. Action steps for some priorities will require collaborating with new areas of the organization, rethinking staffing and acting quickly. Other priorities will require leaders to pin down a long-term strategy and accrue buy-in for new ways of connecting the enterprise.

Whatever the case may be, we welcome a year where networking can play more offense than defense. 

Here are your networking priorities for 2023. 

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