SECURING THE DIGITAL LEGACY: FUTURE-PROOFING THE DATA CENTRE WORKFORCE

The AI boom has led to a technological revolution, creating an unassailable appetite for new data centres that doesn’t appear to be slowing down. But, the industry is hitting a crucial bottleneck: we are running out of the human power required to keep up. 

It’s a challenge being felt across the whole industry. Data from the Uptime Institute’s 2025 Global Data Centre survey revealed that more than half of data centre operators are currently struggling with recruiting and retaining staff—plagued by a shallow talent pool, an ageing workforce and competition from cloud and software firms. 

In Europe alone, vacancy rates are predicted to hit an all-time low of 6.5% by the end of 2026, with the roles facing the highest demand and shortages spanning engineering and technical, construction and project management, to operations and strategic-based roles. It’s a bottleneck that risks derailing billion-pound investments in innovation, at a time when scaling is almost non-negotiable.

The challenge though, lies in more than just recruitment. It requires an evolution of our workforce: a rethink on how we can upskill, inspire and train traditional employees into a new breed of industrial-digital hybrid engineers. 

The new architecture of talent 

Today’s data centre professionals must be specialists capable of dealing with the shift to increasingly complex, high-density environments. We need technicians who can navigate a world of direct-to-chip liquid cooling, rack densities exceeding 100 kW, and AI-driven predictive maintenance tools.

This gap has become particularly prevalent in the MEP (mechanical, electrical and plumbing) intersection. Traditionally, these roles have operated in distinct siloes. Today though, they’re inextricably linked. With liquid cooling expected to see massive adoption by the end of 2026, according to Research and Markets, the demand for specialists who can bring each element together—understand fluid dynamics, coolant chemistry and high-voltage power distribution—has skyrocketed. 

Despite this surge in demand, operators are struggling to recruit and retain staff because of the sheer speed of growth and a rapid increase in technical complexity. 

Managing the retirement gap

We aren’t just struggling to hire senior-level technicians, we’re also on the verge of losing a wealth of experience, with nearly half of the global data centre workforce over the age of 50, all set to retire within the next few years according to global recruitment experts. A real threat that’s creating a “retirement cliff”. 

Compounding that challenge is the lack of new talent in the pipeline, made worse by the industry’s perception problem, and the public’s lack of awareness about what we do. While education and sentiment around the sector is reportedly growing, over 50% of adults in the UK have still never heard of data centres. A worrying statistic when our collective fate rests in the hands of finding and retaining new talent.

While there’s no way of getting round operating out of windowless sheds, nor the strict NDAs we have to stick to, there’s plenty we can do to help attract the next-generation.

For too long, essential trades like electricians and high-voltage engineers—those now critical to the data centre industry—have been labelled “fallback” jobs; a misconception that poses a real threat to the future of our digital economy. We need to remember that these are vital contributing occupations, not just to the global data centre industry, but also to our connected livelihoods.

It’s about flipping the script so that people are clued up on the value of those roles, the increasing level of skill required and what they can help the world achieve—from finance and healthcare, to powering scientific research. It can also be a lucrative, rewarding job, with those roles within the data centre sector paying up to 30% more than standard construction jobs. 

Despite the obvious benefits, we still face a deficit of 400,000 workers, according to the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. 

Another missed opportunity to plug the gap is the growing gender divide in the industry, with women making up less than 10% of the workforce, according to Onnec Group. It’s like we’re trying to solve a global labour crisis with one arm tied behind our back. Solving this isn’t just about awareness, it’s about representation—something I know my colleague, Patricia Carbajo Jiminez, a research and development engineer at our parent company, LFB Group, talked about recently.

If we’re going to survive beyond that retirement cliff I mentioned, we’ve got to be willing to educate and inspire others, and let people into our windowless world. By educating early and broadening our reach, we can help to transform the sector from this invisible utility to a sector built for innovators and engineers.

A relationship-led approach

We’re noticing a real shift away from the traditional structure of nurturing and recruiting talent in our industry. Unlike most industries, we’re not bound by the often linear progression of school, college and university. The skills and experience required to thrive in our world can’t often be taught in a classroom; instead, they need to be shown.

Interest in apprenticeships has reportedly increased by as much as 7% this year according to gov.uk data, with businesses investing in new recruits and long-term partnerships with universities and technical colleges. 

They’re statistics that won’t surprise you if you recognise the benefits. The biggest one for me being that they create opportunities for on-site experience. 

For those of us already living and breathing it, there's a big element of learning on the job; to adapt, try and retest. Real-world experiences in this industry can’t be underestimated, that’s why we’re seeing recruitment experts, data centre leaders and influencers—those with an already deep understanding of the landscape and a network of connections to show for it—setting up propositions to specifically target the skilled workforce we need. 

As someone who’s been in the industry for over three decades, it’s why myself and the team get out of the office so regularly; taking trips to conferences and events, to sit on panels, listen to talks and share what we know. Fundamentally, to collaborate, build relationships and open the door for someone else. That ethos is everything we live by at Apx. 

We've seen how an experience and engineering-first, relationship-led approach serves as the ultimate differentiator in a tightening market. It’s the approach we apply to our own customers, because it allows us to get the most out of our products and their operations, but, crucially, it’s also a mindset that we take with our internal teams. It’s a principle that builds a strong foundation for the future of digital infrastructure and data centres; one we believe is built on collaboration, through and through.

My advice to you? Encourage that togetherness; empower your older, more experienced workforce to work closely with those newer entrants, like apprentices. Break up department siloes. Get out of our windowless sheds, meet and talk to people. Use these as opportunities to share and handover knowledge, tell stories about mistakes, successes and learnings, all to inspire the next generation.

The future 

There’s a tendency in this industry to walk before we can run; to the point where we’re always being reactive—to the next investment, to the next innovation. Predicting what’s around the corner in five-ten years’ time. Yet, we rarely stop to look at what’s happening now. Right now, there’s a real threat bubbling under the surface that we need to first treat—people. 

Switching our mindset to proactive thinking—what skills might we need in two years’ time, how might advancements in technology change how we recruit, and how can we replace the talent we’re likely to lose within the next decade—will enable us to react to whatever the industry throws at us next.

Data centres will be built with modular hardware and managed by software, but they will always be powered by expertise. If we don’t invest in people today, that digital horizon we’re all chasing will stay forever out of reach.