Spotlight

Name: Jeff Quinlan
Title: Facility Mgr
#of years at position: With current company 3+.  Years in field 15.

Q. How long have you been involved in the datacenter environment? 

A. 10+

Q. What major changes have you seen in the data center environment since you have worked in it?

A. The constant change in power/cooling needs due to high speed servers.   

Q. How important are standards or guidelines like the Uptime Institute's Tier system to you and your company?

A. Important, but not closely monitored.  I'll be attending a 2 day seminar in NYC in May to get a better understanding.

Q. How important are green initiatives at your data center and if you have an initiative in place can you provide an example?

A. Important to me.  However, because we colo I have very little control of these issues.

Q. How important is cost reductive policies and initiatives at your data center?What types of cost reductive initiatives have you set into place if applicable?

A. Similar to above, I have very little say in the matter.  But from a cost matter on my end that I can control we have increased power from 110 to 208 so we can reduce the number of cabinets/footprints that we are paying for.

Q. How has your data center budget been impacted over the last 3 years and how do you see it changing in the future?

A. Budget has changed drastically.  In fact, as a result of our DC budget doubling.  I performed a year long search and seizure study to find us a new DC.  After visiting over 30 DC's in the NE and Mid-west.  And narrowing down the top 3 choices.  At the end, our existing colo beat all other offers.

Q. What major technology has impacted your data center?

A. As of today nothing.

Q. What technology do you feel will impact your data center in the future?

A. Tough to answer at this time.

Q. What professional training and knowledge should a data center manager have today?

A. DCJ training course and newsletter.  I said to myself the other day during a class.  I thought I knew that and I didn't.

Q. How has physical and logical security impacted your data center today and how will it in the future?

A. At this time we have been unimpeded with security issues.  Thankfully, we have a full-time security dept that handles all

Q. How would you describe the communication between your department and upper (C suite) management? Does this line of communication provide advantages or disadvantages? Please describe.

A. Communication within our dept is great.  We have wkly data center meetings with a rep from IT, Netops, Hostops and the SOC present at meeting that covers everything that's needed for current and future customer needs.  Goes very smooth.  ITA is not your normal company. LOL!

Q. What is the most under rated or not thought of part of your job that should be given a greater focus?

A. The most under rated part of my job is the amount of work I put in behind the scenes that no one sees or appreciates.  I've always said, facilities is a thankless job.  If you do your job it's because you're supposed to and no one says thank you.  If you screw-up, better bet your ass you're going to hear it.

Q. How will the data center evolve in the next 10 years?

A. Good question.  With Virtualization on the rise along with containers, who knows?  Let's sit back and watch.