Lizzy McDowell, Director of Advertising at Kao Information, argues it’s time we stopped letting digital infrastructure keep ‘invisible’ – and began telling the tales that deliver new folks into the trade.
I completely love what I do, and I’m grateful daily that the info centre trade discovered me. If I’d recognized about it earlier, I’d have chosen it in a heartbeat. However that’s the issue – I didn’t know. Most individuals don’t.
That realisation was the preliminary spark behind Important Careers, an initiative we launched at Kao Information to have fun the exceptional girls powering digital infrastructure. We began with a easy query: why does an trade this essential, this dynamic, and this stuffed with alternative stay so invisible to the individuals who may thrive in it?
The reply, we discovered, wasn’t a scarcity of attention-grabbing tales; it was that no person was telling them. So we determined to vary that. We started by talking to girls throughout the sector – from engineers to executives, from these simply beginning out to trade veterans.
What emerged was a coffee-table model ebook that includes sincere, in-depth conversations about careers, challenges, and what it actually means to work in an trade that underpins fashionable life. No two tales had been the identical, however collectively they painted an image of risk that we felt the world wanted to see.
The way it’s going
The response has been extraordinary. Since launching Important Careers in June 2025, we’ve hosted occasions, launched a podcast collection, and constructed a group of people that share our perception that this trade deserves higher illustration.
What’s struck me most is how private the conversations have change into. At a current occasion, I watched as girls from throughout the sector related over shared experiences – the identical doubts, the identical breakthroughs, the identical willpower to show that digital infrastructure isn’t only a boys’ membership. One attendee instructed me afterwards that seeing herself mirrored in these tales made her realise she belonged right here. That’s precisely what we got down to obtain.
We’re decided to problem the outdated notion that knowledge centres are gray bins staffed by grey-haired folks. The truth couldn’t be extra completely different. That is an trade constructing society’s future, and it wants contemporary views, numerous considering, and individuals who truly see issues in a different way.
The podcast has given us a platform to have deeper conversations that permit folks share their journeys in their very own phrases – unfiltered and genuine. It’s change into one in all my favorite elements of this initiative.
The place we’re heading
This column marks a brand new chapter for the mission. Every month, I’ll be sharing ideas, tales, and views from throughout the digital infrastructure group – typically my very own, typically from the sensible folks I meet via the Important Careers motion.
My ambition is easy: I would like this trade to be one that folks actively select, not one they stumble into. Meaning persevering with to inform tales that encourage, problem stereotypes, and showcase the breadth of alternative that lies throughout the digital infrastructure sector. It means creating areas the place folks really feel they belong, no matter their background or how they discovered their option to knowledge centres.
We’re additionally targeted on turning inspiration into motion. Important Careers isn’t nearly consciousness – it’s about constructing a group that helps one another, opens doorways, and always works to make this trade extra inclusive. Meaning connecting with colleges, universities, and other people wanting a brand new profession change who’ve by no means thought-about digital infrastructure as a vacation spot.
The digital infrastructure trade is rising quicker than nearly some other sector, and funding in it’s unprecedented. The query is whether or not we will develop the expertise pipeline to match.
I consider we will – however provided that we unite throughout the trade and get severe about telling our story.
That is only the start. I hope you’ll be part of me.
