Without vigilance, existing vendors, products, and employee relationships may lead to inferior infrastructure.

From the Big Apple to Denver, chapter board members proactively reach out to local universities to engage and introduce STEM students to the data center industry.

AFCOM chapter aims to ward off 'silver tsunami' by offering internships to students looking to replace legacy data center workers.

With such a proliferation of standards, how can companies understand which ones to follow?

AFCOM study looks at industry growth and trends in data center skills and technology

By conducting work with a single department utilizing consistent procedures and training methods, risk is further diminished.

No doubt somebody somewhere is pitching an executive about the wonders of robotic IT staff or a data center completely run by HAL or IBM Watson. A better approach for data center managers is to gravitate toward the tangible, obvious implementations.

Ellen Rubin founded e-commerce startup Manna at the height of the dot-com boom, and when the bubble burst, Manna went with it, but that didn't stop her from moving forward.

Here are some of the most insightful predictions from those that study data center operations, and those that work at its sharp end.

In what should be a comfortably advancing career, the over-40 group faces a hard choice – learn new skills or face early retirement – or worse, be consigned to performing IT grunt work for the latest hot-shot hire who is 20 years their junior.