Assess Current Capabilities: A Reality Check Before Your SASE Journey

Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) offers a transformative vision — converging network and security functions into a unified, cloud-native architecture. It promises simplicity, agility, and a future-proof foundation for modern enterprise connectivity.

But every journey needs a starting point.

Before defining your SASE future state, you need a grounded understanding of where you stand today. That means assessing not just your technologies, but your architecture, operating model, risks, and readiness across people and process.

It’s a critical step — and one many organisations skip or rush. But done right, it gives you the clarity to shape an informed roadmap, avoid duplication, and build on strengths rather than start from scratch.

This blog post explores what a capability assessment should include, why it matters to the business, and how leaders can drive it effectively — even in complex environments.

Why Capability Assessments Matter

When leaders think about digital transformation, the instinct is often to look forward. But transformation without reflection leads to overspend, under-delivery, and missed opportunities.

Here’s what a structured capability assessment unlocks:

  • Informed decision-making — Know what to keep, what to integrate, and what to retire.
  • Efficient investment — Focus budget and effort where it drives the most value.
  • Reduced risk — Identify gaps, overlaps, or fragile dependencies before they impact service.
  • Alignment — Ensure security, networking, cloud, and business teams are starting from the same facts.

In essence, it transforms “we think we need SASE” into “we know where SASE fits in our journey.”

What to Assess: A Leader’s View of SASE Readiness

A good capability assessment goes beyond the firewall inventory or VPN throughput. It should include a cross-functional view across five key dimensions.

1. Network Architecture and Connectivity

Understand how your users, applications, and systems connect today.

Key questions:

  • Where are your users based — and how do they access applications?
  • Do you still rely on hub-and-spoke data centre models or MPLS networks?
  • Are you using SD-WAN? If so, how consistently and at what maturity?
  • How do you handle local internet breakout and cloud access?

Purpose: Identify where SASE can reduce latency, simplify routing, or replace legacy WAN topologies.

2. Security Controls and Enforcement Points

Assess what security capabilities you currently use — and where they’re deployed.

Key questions:

  • What tools do you use for secure web gateways, firewalls, CASB, or ZTNA?
  • Are controls deployed at the perimeter, in the cloud, or on the endpoint?
  • Is policy enforcement centralised or fragmented?
  • Can you apply consistent controls across hybrid work, cloud, and third parties?

Purpose: Spot redundancies, identify capability gaps, and understand what can be consolidated under a SASE model.

3. Identity and Access Foundations

In SASE, identity becomes the control plane. Weak identity = weak architecture.

Key questions:

  • Do you have a unified identity provider (IdP) across users and devices?
  • Are roles, groups, and permissions well maintained?
  • Do you use conditional access and strong authentication?
  • Can you enforce policies based on user risk or device posture?

Purpose: Evaluate how ready your organisation is for Zero Trust access at scale.

4. Monitoring, Visibility, and Operational Maturity

You can’t protect or optimise what you can’t see.

Key questions:

  • Do you have visibility from user to application — across locations?
  • Are incidents and anomalies correlated across security and network domains?
  • How much is automated, and what’s still manual?
  • Do you have the skills and processes to manage a converged environment?

Purpose: Identify capability gaps that may affect control, performance, or response in a SASE world.

5. Cultural and Change Readiness

Technology is only half the story.

Key questions:

  • Are your teams (security, network, cloud) siloed or collaborative?
  • Are there overlapping tools owned by different teams?
  • Is there executive support for convergence and simplification?
  • Have you mapped who will operate and support the SASE environment?

Purpose: Surface friction points and clarify the cultural shifts needed for success.

Conducting the Assessment: Practical Advice for Leaders

A capability assessment doesn’t have to be long or complex. It does need to be honest, cross-functional, and clearly scoped.

Here’s how leaders can drive it effectively.

1. Define Why You’re Assessing

Make the objective clear: you’re not trying to audit or criticise — you’re trying to enable smarter decision-making and prioritisation.

2. Engage the Right Stakeholders

Involve leads from:

  • Network and infrastructure
  • Security and risk
  • Cloud and application platforms
  • End-user computing
  • Business functions (where relevant)

Everyone owns part of the picture.

3. Use a Consistent Framework

Adopt a lightweight maturity model or scoring rubric across the five key domains. This helps reduce bias and create a clear baseline.

Example scale:

  • 1: Ad hoc or unmanaged
  • 2: Defined but inconsistent
  • 3: Standardised and documented
  • 4: Automated or policy-driven
  • 5: Fully integrated and optimised

4. Document Gaps and Opportunities, Not Just Scores

Focus less on who owns what, and more on:

  • Where are we duplicating effort?
  • Where are we exposed or at risk?
  • What strengths can we build on?
  • Where would convergence reduce friction?

5. Turn Insight Into Action

Your assessment should lead directly into next steps:

  • A high-level roadmap or transformation plan
  • Clear priorities for the first phase of SASE deployment
  • Budget or business case discussions
  • Internal alignment conversations

Common Missteps to Avoid

  • Over-reliance on tooling inventories — Knowing what you have is not the same as knowing how well it works.
  • Siloed assessments — You need both network and security views.
  • Lack of executive visibility — Senior support helps drive decisions and investment.
  • No follow-through — The assessment should feed into strategy, not sit on a shelf.

Conclusion: Know Before You Grow

SASE isn’t a plug-and-play technology stack — it’s an architecture shift that requires self-awareness. That’s why assessing your current capabilities is more than due diligence. It’s the difference between strategic change and expensive reinvention.

By investing time upfront to understand where you stand, you make smarter decisions, reduce risk, and bring your teams along the journey with confidence and clarity.

Every transformation starts with a mirror — not a map.