The data center manager, these days, enjoys a peculiar position. Protected by sheer importance—the data center is an increasingly vital part of everyday operations and the long-term health of the company—yet potentially doomed by that same importance, the data center manager must be kept on hand. Yet should something go wrong, it could mean disaster. The smart data center manager, therefore, works to protect against as many potential problems as possible. But what are some of these problems?

What Problems Keep the Data Center Manager Awake at Night?

Perhaps the biggest problem a data center manager has is just keeping the data center running. Some would say it’s the manager’s only problem. Yet as part of this, there are several potential areas that pose a threat to that ongoing operation.

Frequent change. Not only is there the internal change of the data center—the requirement to absorb incoming new data—but there are also external change agents involved. Consider the impact of a sudden new technology rollout; does the system have sufficient bandwidth? Is a new corporate initiative demanding less power used? These changes can be disastrous.

System failure. A server going down in a data center is like a human losing a limb. It’s a catastrophe. It inherently limits the system’s ability to perform required tasks. It requires resources be diverted to attend to the immediate aftermath of the loss. This means not only immediate performance loss for the data center, but also an ongoing reduction as the problem is addressed. A server is bad enough; imagine what happens when the server is fine, but one cable in a system of miles of same has gone bad.

Power outage. If system failure is like limb loss, a power outage is like a coma. The whole system is down and inaccessible. Trying to plan for such outages is nearly impossible, and the only way to protect the system is to have backup power systems on hand, which can be expensive and difficult to justify.

Hackers. All that data in the data center is valuable. Hackers want it for a variety of reasons, and hackers continually keep at the cutting edge of technology, looking for a way to breach systems and claim that data for their own.

How Can the Smart Data Center Manager Protect against These Threats?

For the best protection a data center manager—or most anyone else—can ask for, start by dropping us a line at Emcon IT. Emcon IT has previously offered services to Fortune 500 firms, and offers both hardware support and professional services with a clear focus on quality as expressed by standardized metrics. For those data center managers who’d rather get some sleep at night, getting in touch with us at Emcon IT will be the smartest move around.