Technology organizations within a company are more interdependent now than ever before. Teams that focus on the datacenter, facilities, and the IT estate make decisions on a daily basis that impact their peer organizations, and there’s never been a greater need for coordination and visibility among these teams.
As the longtime Program Chair of Enterprise Connect, the leading independent conference and expo for IT and CX technology decision-makers, I see this regularly from the IT angle. So much of IT pros’ jobs these days involves understanding and connecting with peers from other parts of the technology and business organizations. Whether the issue is cybersecurity, customer service, employees’ work experience at the office/facility, or the business case for AI, IT leaders can’t make the right technology, vendor, and strategy choices without a strong web of collaboration among those who either enable or benefit from the services that IT deploys.
As IT grapples with the ever-evolving issues around where to deploy services – cloud, edge, or premises – their need to understand the fast-paced developments in the datacenter has only grown. That’s why I’m pleased that our event is partnering with the leading datacenter association to bring this perspective to our event this coming March.
The centerpiece of this partnership will be a breakout session entitled, How Your Enterprise’s Datacenter Strategy Affects Collaboration & CX, led by Ryan Gruver, president of the Arizona chapter of AFCOM, the datacenter industry’s leading and longest-standing professional association. The session abstract notes that, “Cost, application performance, AI decisions, data residency, and a host of other issues hinge on the choices your enterprise makes about what to deploy on premises, in enterprise datacenters, or in single- and multi-tenant clouds,” and those decisions in turn impact all of the teams responsible for the different elements.
When I chatted with Ryan about doing the session, he was passionate about the need for stakeholders from IT (including collab/CX folks) to work more closely with those from the facilities and datacenter teams. I’m looking forward to the insights Ryan will share.
We’d love to see Enterprise Connect 2026 be the place where datacenter experts and IT pros can come together to build the ties and strengthen the collaboration that will benefit both enterprise users and the business. We’ve extended our Super Early Bird rate through January 23 with code SUPERDCW, so you can still get in on the best prices for the IT/collaboration/CX tech industry’s largest independent event. I hope to see you March 10 – 12 in Las Vegas!