As a trusted advisor to CIOs and their staff, we often hear the dirty little secrets. We call it the “close the door moment.” We know when a client lowers their voice and says, “Would you please close the door?” we are about to hear what’s keeping the client awake.
We recently had a client reach out with a unique problem. “Facilities needs to add an elevator to the building, and it must go through the data center. Can you help?”
What the client was asking was how to mitigate risk in the buildout. This is a perfect example of where external services are of benefit.
We are in data centers nearly every day. From 500 square feet to 50,000 square feet and beyond, this is one of our core areas. We assist with the processes, oversight, management structures, systems migrations, etc.
Obviously this client had architectural/structural/construction resources, and none were familiar with risk mitigation during construction and on to operation.
Clearly adding an elevator shaft to an operating data center presents challenges in construction dust/debris, vibration, EMI of the running elevator, security, cooling, power, network, etc. By bringing to bear our perspectives garnered over many data center expansions, we delivered a risk mitigation plan allowing construction and operation to continue, while also adding some facility improvements to create an overall better data center for this client.
From the client perspective, construction in and around the data center was a very scary thought. Because we help numerous clients, we had the skills and knowledge to help the client on a very efficient basis.
The CIO knew he needed help, and did not hesitate asking for help early in the construction process.