Network Access Control For Dummies®

11.1. Gearing Up for the Deployment

Follow several incremental steps to appropriately ensure that the chosen vendor's solution meets your needs and that the full rollout will go smoothly. In our experience, most organizations follow a typical four-point deployment, as shown in Figure 11-1:

1. Proof-of-concept test

2. Pilot implementation

3. Larger scale rollout focusing on evaluating policies, rather than enforcing them

4. Full deployment of the NAC program

Figure 11.1. Steps to a successful NAC implementation.

Your company may use a slightly different phased deployment, but understanding what goes on in each phase can help you form your own plan, even if you don't use the deployment steps that we detail in this chapter.

11.1.1. The proof is in the pudding

You typically first do a proof-of-concept test on a vendor's equipment. This test lets you determine major roadblocks that you might run into when you move forward into the deployment. In this phase of testing, you want to work with key stakeholders in the organization to ensure that the proposed NAC solution meets their needs:

• Network architects or designers: They want to ensure that the NAC solution meets the security objectives set forth in the policies.

• Network administrators: These stakeholders want to ensure that the system is manageable and user-friendly, and that it offers the appropriate level of visibility into events and traffic ...