CTI provides an array of professional services including, project management, strategic assessments, design, implementation, training, and ongoing support.

Project Management

Coleman Technologies has developed a standardized Project Management Methodology based on our systems engineering heritage that enables our network engineering solutions and services. This methodology allows us to remain flexible and engage widely-varied and complex problems with a tested and proven approach to produce consistently excellent results. Despite the unique features of each and every project, CTI can approach each in a consistent manner with the expectation of success.

CTI’s Project Management Methodology comprises a proven project management methodology built on the PDIO model, enhanced with our rich background of aerospace system engineering expertise. This leads to timely, consistent, professional implementation and satisfied customers time and again. CTI’s approach to project management provides a number of benefits to customers, including:

• Customer business requirements are accurately translated into functional specifications utilizing the given technologies

• Increased productivity reduces overall costs of project and reduces deployment time, allowing customer to enjoy ROI in a significantly shorter timeframe.

• Our Customer Web Portal allows customers and project team members to track project progress and deliverables at any time throughout the deployment

• Quality Assurance is built into the formal Project Management

CTI has several highly certified project managers with experience in large, complex projects. Our project management team uses standard project management tools as well as internally developed tools such as our web-based portal that is designed to show up-to-date project status and provide a standard method of communication for the entire project team.

* Figure 1 The Plan/Design/Implement/Operate (PDIO) model provides a clear engagement plan to ensure project success.

Planning Phase:

During this initial phase, CTI engineers determine the business and technical needs that are the driving force behind the design. While performing this analysis, CTI engineers review the existing network infrastructure, operational plans, organizational structure, and strategic objectives to develop a project plan that will provide maximum benefit to the organization.
This project plan is typically defined in terms of system objectives and requirements, system specifications, and implementation overviews sufficient for budget and planning purposes. Critical operating parameters such as quality of service and fault tolerance are identified as part of the design process.

Design Phase:
During the design phase, CTI engineers develop a comprehensive network design that fulfills the requirements identified in the first phase. The design process generates a wealth of information including product specifications, project milestones, network diagrams, hardware and software configurations, implementation procedures and timetables, and testing plans. This documentation later becomes the critical component for maintaining and troubleshooting the network infrastructure.

Our process includes a comprehensive detailed design workshop in which we perform a deep dive into the customer’s network and business processes in order to fully understand the business and technical requirements of the solution. This information is captured into a Detailed Design Document (DDD) that will form the basis of the implementation. It is critical that all business requirements are properly translated into the technical specifications required for complete success. Our baseline DDD includes many years of lessons learned that ensures we address all aspects of the design. Utilizing this process, CTI has performed many large and complex implementations with great success and high levels of customer satisfaction.

Implement Phase:
After the project details have been developed, reviewed, and approved, the project moves to implementation. A team of CTI engineers implements the project according to the developed plan. Concurrently, project management services are provided by CTI to ensure that critical project milestones are met. CTI engineers work closely with key customer staff during this phase to ensure thorough training and a clear understanding of the new network design.

The Implement phase includes the physical installation, configuration, testing and evaluation of the solution. To ensure a smooth implementation, CTI will take a very careful and conservative integration approach, affecting only specific active systems at specific times. We believe this controlled environment will allow for the least amount of end user impact and the maximum testing before going “fully” live.

In order to ensure quality on the final product, CTI has developed a comprehensive Network Ready for Use (NRFU) test document. CTI utilizes this document, in conjunction with the DDD, to fully test the system prior to system cutover to ensure proper operation of all components and ensure that the system meets the specified business objectives as well as CTI quality standards.

Operate Phase:
CTI firmly stands behind its design and implementation methods and offers a variety of post-implementation support offerings to assure the continued success of our solutions. It is our experience that the first few weeks after implementation of a new system are a critical time in the project lifecycle. Maintaining an on-site presence with the engineers that helped design and implement the solution is vital in order to quickly respond to unforeseen events.

This additional support may be in the form of on-call, on-site, or remotely managed services depending on the needs of the client. On-site services include CTI engineers to proactively maintain, manage, and troubleshoot network implementations and provide a single point of contact. Contracted on-call services allow the client to minimize their support costs for services and are provided on a 24x7 basis. Remote network management is performed from the CTI network operations center through VPN or direct connection to a network.

These offerings include:

• Onsite Day-1 Support: CTI provides additional onsite support to resolve any implementation issues and provide additional end-user training.

• Day 2 Support Offerings: CTI offers two Day 2 support that includes web, phone, and e-mail access to create cases within the CTI NOC for 8x5 or 24x7 case resolution services. Day 2 support includes discounted service hours to resolve network issues, quarterly network health checks, and bi-annual software patches to keep equipment up-to-date.

• Managed Services/Network Monitoring: CTI offers network monitoring services to support for mission-critical systems. Managed Services provide an end to end view of the performance and availability from an independent and external source and include 24/7 network monitoring and NOC access, monthly reports on activity, and periodic recommendations, and ticket generation and issue-resolution processes.

Strategic Assessments

CTI’s team of experienced network engineers performs on-site, on-network assessments of current network operations.  Assessments focus on network performance, reliability, scalability and perhaps most importantly, security.  We augment this empirical information with interviews of IT and other appropriate staff.  Recommendations are provided in terms of a “Strategic Network Assessment Document” outlining observations, deficiencies, and recommendations for immediate tactical actions as well as strategic plans for the organization.  Selected staff is certified in security systems (CISSP), internetworking (CCIE, CCDA, CCNA, etc.), and infrastructure software (MCSE, CNE, etc.).

Network design and hardware specification

CTI engineers provide design services separate from or as part of overall project implementations.  The design starts with a focus on overall system reliability and availability supporting other requirements such as scalability, performance, security, and manageability.  Staff is certified in internetworking (CCIE, CCDA, CCNA, etc.) and experienced on a wide array of hardware and software systems.

Configuration and implementation

Configuration and implementation services are offered by CTI to support turnkey implementations.  These services extent beyond simple "rack and stack" and include all configuration and testing to support a seamless network rollout.  CTI’s implementation methodology focuses around a core maxim “its broken until its tested” and therefore all implementations involve the development and execution of appropriate test plans.

Customized technical staff training

Our goal in any project implementation is to provide an appropriately engineered solution which meets customer requirements and which can be maintained by customer staff.  We customize on-site technical training to this end.

Network management and on-going support

CTI provides on-site and remote 24x7 off-site network monitoring services in addition to special on-going network services crafted to meet specific customer needs.  Monitoring includes “up/down” status of network electronics, capacity and performance of selected equipment, and intrusion detection.  CTI can coordinate responses to actions with the customer, carriers, or take direct action depending on the details of the service level agreement (SLA).