Infrastructure Masons Shape the Future of the Digital Age
And you can too. With 5 of the top hyperscale leaders plus more than $100 billion in infrastructure investment, together we can make a real difference.
If our near 100% membership renewal rate is any indication, people get a lot of value out of the organization. But once in a while we do get asked “What’s the value of Infrastructure Masons to me?”
We’ve written before about membership benefits including:
- Access to members-only events around the world. Take a seat at a roundtable with your peers and work to resolve a key industry challenge. Then grab a drink.
- The opportunity to join committees working on issues like education and diversity that affect all of us.
- The opportunity to join working groups to create innovative solutions to tough industry challenges.
There’s another benefit we haven’t talked about as much, at least not directly: The ability to truly shape the future of the Digital Age.
The ability to truly shape the future of the Digital Age
There is no group better equipped to lead the industry into the future than Infrastructure Masons. Think about it: Our members have built over a hundred billion dollars worth of digital infrastructure. They are the people who literally built the foundation of the Internet as we know it. They have been, and continue to be, inventing the future as they go. There is no manual for the work they’re doing, because they’re the first ones to do it.
“There is no group better equipped to lead the digital infrastructure industry into the future than Infrastructure Masons.” – Click to tweet
And when they come together as iMasons, wow. Together, we can shape how well equipped digital infrastructure is to accommodate the demand that is only intensifying – and the impact that will have on our world.
These opportunities are open to all Infrastructure Masons members. You can help shape the future.
You can shape the environmental impact of digital infrastructure
The impact of digital infrastructure on the environment is an important issue for many iMasons. As one end user put it, “If we move as an industry to try to change this stuff [our environmental impact] it’s so much more powerful. The government isn’t going to take care of this. It is our responsibility.”
As an Infrastructure Mason, you have the opportunity to serve on the Technical Committee’s DCPI working group. The Data Center Performance Index (DCPI) is a new global rating system, developed by iMasons, that measures the actual performance of colocation data centers. (Read the Thoughts paper to learn more.)
“As an Infrastructure Mason you can shape the environmental impact of digital infrastructure.” – Click to tweet
You can shape the face(s) of the industry
Gender diversity is another issue near and dear to the hearts of many Infrastructure Masons. As is the talent gap. As we’ve pointed out, “In the tech industry we’ll be hard-pressed to keep the lights on, much less cure death or colonize Mars if we don’t bridge the talent gap. Fortunately, we needn’t look far to do that: Women represent a huge and relatively untapped pool of tech talent.”
Here again Infrastructure Masons have a unique opportunity to make a real difference. As a member you can join the IM Women group and help support our 50% Solution and other initiatives designed to increase gender diversity in the industry.
“Women represent a huge and relatively untapped pool of tech talent. As an Infrastructure Mason you can impact gender diversity.” – Click to tweet
You can shape the next generation of digital infrastructure leaders
Who will take the reins next is a question on the minds of many iMasons. As one partner asked it, “When I think about the explosive growth in compute, storage, and network I wonder, ‘Who are the people who are going to make this happen?’ ‘Where are they coming from?’”
In addition to participating in our diversity initiatives, which also aim to close the talent gap, you can join the Education Committee. We’ve got a wide range of initiatives underway, including data center tours, degree and certificate programs, and mentorships.
You can participate with the IM Fund, which was established to realize the founding principle of the iMasons organization: to give back. IM Fund disbursements to date have focused on education, with the goal of enabling access for a broader pool of future masons. (Whether you participate with the IM Fund or not, all iMasons can feel proud that their professional association has a core value of giving back.)
“Who will take the reins next? As an Infrastructure Mason, you can help shape the next generation of industry leaders.” – Click to tweet
You can shape the response when mission critical turns life critical
How do data center partners and end users keep up with scale in a way that doesn’t impact safety? That, said one end user, “is the existential threat.” As mission critical infrastructure becomes life critical infrastructure, its fragility becomes even more serious. As an Infrastructure Mason you have the opportunity to help shape the industry’s answer to that ‘existential threat.’
You can serve on the Technical Committee’s DCiRN working group. DCiRN (pronounced dee-cern) is an open, publicly available database of infrastructure incidents that is being developed as a tool to help improve the safety and reliability of infrastructure systems.
“How does digital infrastructure need to change as mission critical becomes life critical? As an Infrastructure Mason you can help answer that question.” – Click to tweet
And…you can shape the first-ever book to focus on the builders of the Digital Age
Most people don’t know the stories of the leaders who built the foundation of the Internet, who power it and secure it and maintain it – the leaders whose job it is to make sure that what people expect from Google and Facebook and Instagram and Netflix and Amazon and Apple Pay and Snapchat and YouTube and all the others, they get. Bottom line, people don’t know your stories. Of the growth you’ve led. The crises you’ve averted. The innovations you’ve developed. The tough decisions you’ve had to make and the lessons you’ve learned along the way.
But people will, because we’re going to write it down. This book is your story.
We will be interviewing approximately 50 digital infrastructure leaders – people who have built some of the biggest portfolios in the world. Their stories – your story – will form the foundation of the book. If you’d like to contribute, email admin@imasons.org.
