Data Centre Industry to Tackle Skills Shortage
23 July 2013
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Posted by: Louise Fairley
Press Release Data Centre Industry To Tackle Skills Shortage Revelations in the London Evening Standard last September showed that for every graduate post in the UK’s capital there were at least 73 applicants – with an estimated 20,000 graduates in the UK still out of work six months after completing their degrees. Perversely, claims industry body the Data Centre Alliance (DCA), data centre operators are having real difficulties finding suitable new employees for positions in what is possibly the least known but fastest growing area of the economy. After wide-ranging discussion in the data centre industry and academia, including the University of East London and Leeds University – both of which specialise in education in the data centre and IT sectors – DCA has devised a Data Centre “boot camp”. This will comprise data centre training and suitability assessment – which aims to give graduates the additional knowledge they need to successfully apply for data centre related jobs. Additionally, it is anticipated that those who make it through the tough selection and assessment process will be ideally pre-selected candidates for interview by the data centre operators.
Rob Coupland, UK Managing Director of pan-European data centre operator TelecityGroup, one of the sponsors of the pilot DCA Boot Camp, said:
“Due to the specialised nature of the skill-set required in the data centre industry there is a limited pool of exceptional workers out there and, up until now, there have been no graduate programmes specific to the skills required. Only through the on-going development of IT skills will we be able to continue to deliver the level of service our customers expect, this reflects the critical importance of the role of the data centre manager and engineer in today’s data centre industry.” Andrew Fray UK Director for DCA boot camp co-sponsor Telehouse, which operates four data centres in the UK and 45 worldwide added: “I have been looking forward to an opportunity like this, since proposing the concept of a Data Centre Training College in East London as long ago as 2009. We believe that today few are given the opportunity to train for work in data centres; somehow they learn their craft on-the-job.
“Telehouse is supporting the Pilot DCA boot camp because we believe that its rigorous pre-selection allied to a no-nonsense weeding-out process, plus the imparting of essential sector knowledge, will lead to a supply of potential employees who are well positioned to become data centre professionals in London..”
The DCA Data Centre boot camp is free to successful applicants thanks to the sponsorship of data centre operators Telehouse and TelecityGroup plus international data centre training specialists CNet Training, who will deliver the course alongside officers from DCA and lecturers from University of East London. “The boot camp students will learn many of the well-hidden secrets of the data centre industry,” said Simon Campbell-White DCA executive director, “many of the students will be amazed to find out just how many things in their lives require a data centre to make them happen – everything from their Facebook status updates, tweets and e-mails to holiday bookings, traffic lights and parcel deliveries. They will also learn how data centres fit into the world economy as massive ‘factories’ often the size of a dozen or more football pitches – and each consuming as much energy as a small city.”
Andrew Stevens, CEO of CNet Training added, “Once the candidates understand the place of data centres in the world economy we’ll introduce them to a new discipline of ‘critical thinking’ – similar to that taught in the nuclear and airline industries. Because if they can’t do the joined-up thinking necessary to avoid major data centre outages, like we’ve seen in recent years, then they don’t belong in our industry.
“Every minute that a data centre is out of action can affect millions of people and cost literally £billions – so it’s essential that guarding against outages becomes part of every data centre professionals’ DNA. Our training will provide an in-depth technical introduction to the elements associated with efficient operation and maintenance of a data centre and will help open the students’ eyes with regard to the technical career opportunities that could be available to them within this vibrant and fast moving sector.” Rounding up, Campbell-Whyte, said, “DCA is not itself a training organisation which is why we have joined forces with CNet Training and University of East London for this pilot Boot Camp. The mission of DCA is to research and develop best-practice for the benefit of its members and the data centre industry globally.”
Membership of the Data Centre Alliance – where members are expected to share as well as receive best practice knowledge – is open globally to data centre operators, suppliers and individual data centre professionals.
For more information on the DCA Data Centre Boot Camp or the DCA please visit http://www.data-central.org/?page=Foundation_Training
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About Data Centre Alliance The Data Centre Alliance (DCA) is a not-for-profit industry association comprising of Industry leaders and experts from across the data centre sector. The DCA is committed to capturing the best expertise and experience from across the industry for developing standards and guidelines for data centre design, construction and operation. In addition, the DCA is also dedicated to developing programmes of research and innovation to ensure the future health, growth and sustainability of the industry. Membership is open to all operators of data centres and server rooms, however large or small, and organisations that supply the industry with products and services.
About TelecityGroup TelecityGroup is Europe’s leading provider of premium carrier-neutral data centres, operating facilities in city locations across Europe.
TelecityGroup’s data centres provide secure and highly-connected environments for the IT and telecoms equipment that powers the digital economy. Its data centres are enabling environments in which the separate networks that make up the internet meet and where bandwidth intensive applications, content and information are hosted.
TelecityGroup’s customers are the networks and providers of content, applications and data that make up the internet. Customers choose TelecityGroup because of its high-quality infrastructure and service standards, connectivity options and capacity to support their future growth.
Telecity Group plc is listed on the London Stock Exchange (LSE: TCY).
www.telecitygroup.com
About Telehouse
Telehouse provides global Tier III data centres, connectivity and managed ICT solutions, providing secure and resilient infrastructure for mission-critical IT systems.
Established in 1989, Telehouse became Europe’s first carrier neutral colocation provider. Today, the company is at the heart of the Internet and telecommunications infrastructure, serving over 2,000 major corporations worldwide, across a wide range of industries including government and financial institutions.
Telehouse is the data centre subsidiary of Japanese corporation KDDI, a $45 billion Global Fortune 300 telecommunications and systems integration provider. In 2012, Telehouse in conjunction with KDDI launched its own brand of cloud services offering dedicated and hybrid IAAS. W: www.telehouse.net
About CNet Training
After forming in 1996 CNet Training quickly became recognised as the world’s foremost data centre and network infrastructure training organisation. In the intervening years CNet Training established an enviable reputation for the quality of the courses they provide and gained recognition for their forward thinking approach to what we do.
CNet Training continue to design and deliver state-of-the-art training programmes that provide the perfect mix of skills and knowledge required by these vibrant and ever changing sectors, and those that operate within them. By achieving industry recognised qualifications and certifications, course delegates are able to enhance their credentials and increase the professionalism of their industries.
Amongst the many significant landmarks in CNet Training’s history is the development of the highly acclaimed Global Data Centre & Network Infrastructure Education Framework, which offers industry professionals an opportunity to map out and configure a training, qualifications and certifications programme that meets their exact requirements
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CNet Training prides itself on having relationships with all the world’s leading trade associations and industry bodies including the Data Centre Alliance. So trusted is their expertise that they also design and deliver vendor-specific programmes for many of the world’s leading manufacturers of data centre and network infrastructure solutions.
W: www.cnet-training.com
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DCA Vice President & Head of DC Development ABB
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