WHAT’S HOT datacentre alliance
#dcsarticle
http://dcseurope.info/n/tbuz
DCA Drives Forward with its 2012 Agenda Simon Campbell-Whyte, DCA Executive Director reflects on the recent DCA board meeting
The 25th of January saw the 2nd DCA Board of Governors meeting which took place at Haymarket, London. The purpose of the session was to review DCA progress to date and agree the broad agenda for the first half of 2012.
One of the key issues the industry faces is the need to self-govern the application of its own
standards and measures. I’m pleased to say broad agreement was reached by all that the plan will bring clarity to DC resilience levels together with operational professionalism, environmental responsibility and effective security. Backing the Program, Andrew Jay, DCA Vice President commented “This initiative represents real progress for the Industry both for new developments and existing data centre facilities”. Professor Dennis Kehoe DCA, Vice Chairman
added “this is a major factor that unifies every single Data Centre Alliance member, which goes to show that an affordable and truly independent auditing and certification programme is overdue”. Adriaan Oosthoek, DCA Vice President and Telecity MD also backed the proposal saying “Telecity have always taken a responsible approach to openness and transparency, having adopted the EU Code of Conduct for all data centres within the group I always felt there was scope to go much further to ensure the customer was empowered to make informed choices”.
Steven Norris, DCA President summed up “This process is further evidence of an evolving Industry mobilising itself towards effective self governance”. Further agreement was reached on the basis of a plan, which will be reviewed and ratified by the DCA Technical Council and Accreditation Board.
Stephen Dennis of Advantage Resourcing reflects on the DCA Executive debate on skilling and resourcing data centres, 25th January 2012 Le Meridien, Piccadilly
The DCA invited industry leaders to participate in a working lunch held at the fashionable Le Meridien, Piccadilly Hotel. The objective was to debate the issue of finding employable staff for data centre vacancies and the challenges the industry faces, especially as the majority of the first generation of data centre managers, engineers and technical leaders will be approaching retirement within the
next decade or so.
The event provided some key outputs that will be followed up in due course. The session was kindly sponsored by DCA Partner, Advantage Technical Resourcing who’s director Stephen Dennis commented: “Advantage Technical Resourcing were pleased to be able to assist the DCA with the event hosting on this key topic of DC staffing, which has a broad impact across the DCA members business’ including ours. Through the solutions division we provide DC Operational services and through the Advantage Technical Resourcing broader responsibilities source and provide such diminishing staffing resources Globally. We are therefore able to act as a barometer re
“The biggest cause of data centre outages is human error so the training of our people should be the industry’s top priority.” Andrew Jay, DCA VP and Head of Data Centres EMEA, CB Richard Ellis
”supply and demand” of such skills and are duly concerned regarding the situation going forward, especially in the light of predicted DC growth and associated increasing demand.” The session was chaired by DCA president and Chairman of Virtus Datacentres Steven Norris who co-ordinated the discussion attended by 6Degress, Telehouse, TelecityGroup, Savvis, PTS Consulting and CBRE. PTS Director John
8
www.dcseurope.info I March 2012
McComish said: “As a global provider of Data Centre consultancy PTS has over many years encountered a shortage of personnel with the relevant credentials to work in this Mission Critical environment. We recognise the need to encourage and fully support an accredited and sustainable educational framework in this area.” Whilst Telecity MD Adriaan Oosthoek added: “It is encouraging to see a common understanding regarding the skills gap facing the data centre industry, as well as a real appetite around the table to find solutions for address it. It is clear there will not be a simple answer, we will need to implement different measures and practices to resolve the issue. Only through the on-going development of IT skills will we be able to continue to deliver the level of service our customers expect and it is clear that private sector involvement is absolutely necessary in this process. TelecityGroup fully backs this approach.” Andrew Fray of Telehouse continued: “The Skilling and Resourcing Data Centres discussion was extremely interesting. In short, there is a gap in the market which needs to be filled with skilled, trained and talented data centre staff. This is a global gap, not just a UK one. The first step needs to be training needs analysis, followed by engagement. Telehouse looks forward to both.”
Roger Castle Finance VP at Savvis concluded “A most enjoyable and open debating session addressing the key issue of how we capture the opportunity of the UK harbouring Data Centres as one of the key growth industries of the next decade, through ensuring that we are able to feed our businesses with a suitably qualified stream of quality talent.”
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48