The QTS Experience

Mayor Tiffany O’Donnell never planned to run City Hall. Now she’s making the case that Cedar Rapids spent decades preparing for its next chapter. We get into data centers, water and power questions, jobs, property-tax relief, why relationships matter, and the kitten who briefly joined the conversation.

Chapters:

00:00  Why a pilot, media personality and entrepreneur ran for mayor

02:45  What people really want from local leadership

03:20  Building a city her children might come home to

05:03  Data centers, public debate and the leadership gap

07:08  Why Iowa and Cedar Rapids fit hyperscale infrastructure

10:07  From skepticism to facts: what communities should evaluate

12:03  Water, power and the deeper debate about AI

13:16  Property-tax relief and the economic-development case

16:25  When facts no longer change the conversation

17:50  Data sovereignty and where digital life actually lives

20:42  “Why not us?” Cedar Rapids prepared for this moment

23:00  Not every data center is a hyperscale campus

26:27  What other mayors are asking about data centers

28:19  Meet Lewis, the mayor’s very vocal kitten

29:16  Trust, direct access and choosing long-term partners

35:55  How Cedar Rapids keeps its identity while it grows

38:33  How companies earn trust: be present and build relationships

39:43  Sicilian meatballs, a Delta 88 and the Cutting Crew

43:20  The takeaway: leadership is hard, and it matters

Links:

Mayor Tiffany O’Donnell — official City of Cedar Rapids mayor page: https://www.cedar-rapids.org/local_government/city_council/mayor_and_city_council/mayor.php

City of Cedar Rapids: https://www.cedar-rapids.org/

QTS Cedar Rapids campus: https://q.com/data-centers/cedar-rapids/

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe! For more information, go to https://www.QTSDataCenters.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

Mayor Tiffany O’Donnell never planned to run City Hall. Now she’s making the case that Cedar Rapids spent decades preparing for its next chapter. We get into data centers, water and power questions, jobs, property-tax relief, why relationships matter, and the kitten who briefly joined the conversation.

Chapters:

00:00 Why a pilot, media personality and entrepreneur ran for mayor

02:45 What people really want from local leadership

03:20 Building a city her children might come home to

05:03 Data centers, public debate and the leadership gap

07:08 Why Iowa and Cedar Rapids fit hyperscale infrastructure

10:07 From skepticism to facts: what communities should evaluate

12:03 Water, power and the deeper debate about AI

13:16 Property-tax relief and the economic-development case

16:25 When facts no longer change the conversation

17:50 Data sovereignty and where digital life actually lives

20:42 “Why not us?” Cedar Rapids prepared for this moment

23:00 Not every data center is a hyperscale campus

26:27 What other mayors are asking about data centers

28:19 Meet Lewis, the mayor’s very vocal kitten

29:16 Trust, direct access and choosing long-term partners

35:55 How Cedar Rapids keeps its identity while it grows

38:33 How companies earn trust: be present and build relationships

39:43 Sicilian meatballs, a Delta 88 and the Cutting Crew

43:20 The takeaway: leadership is hard, and it matters

Links:

Mayor Tiffany O’Donnell — official City of Cedar Rapids mayor page: https://www.cedar-rapids.org/local_government/city_council/mayor_and_city_council/mayor.php

City of Cedar Rapids: https://www.cedar-rapids.org/

QTS Cedar Rapids campus: https://q.com/data-centers/cedar-rapids/

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe! For more information, go to https://www.Q.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

Mark Gusakov is back, and told me about a town hall where the EMS guy fighting the data center didn't know it answers his 911 calls. Mark’s answer isn’t a better argument. It’s listening first, and he’s got a Lamborghini story to prove it.

Chapters:

00:00:06 Mark's road back: Uptime, nine months around the world, and founding the Digital Infrastructure Alliance

00:05:42 CONN3CT DATA, Cristo Rey students, and a Miss America who is a nuclear engineer

00:08:18 Why data centers are suddenly in the public conversation

00:10:19 Listen, talk, understand: why the pushback is appropriate

00:13:18 Is fear fair when the facts are wrong? The rake story

00:18:03 Lamborghinis for dirt-road folks: find out what a community needs

00:20:30 Amateur hour, not malice: when it stopped being engineer to engineer

00:25:42 The EMS worker who didn't know a data center answers 911

00:30:11 SWAT in the data center, “please come with your concern,” and being understood

00:33:29 Skeptics, cynics, and Ken at the town hall

00:38:02 Who wins the AI race? The town that asks you to come back

00:44:34 “It's just no”: John Dutton, the Amish, and Mr. Ford's softer seats

00:53:50 Ego, mentors, and the pushback inside the industry

01:01:08 Forcing functions, PUE, and why the lava is soft again

01:06:54 Two concrete actions, and “We are not the enemy”

Links:

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe!

For more information, go to https://www.QTSDataCenters.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

Ana Tardio grew up a picky eater in Spain. Then her aunt in Mexico served her ant eggs. Her TEDxAtlanta talk is about food as a bridge, so I asked how a company like ours earns a seat at the table. Listen more than you talk.

Chapters:

00:00 From the south of Spain to a Chicago winter

01:33 Food as a way in, and a plate of ant eggs

08:15 Food is for sharing: tapas, raciones and sobremesa

09:59 How a company talk became a TEDxAtlanta talk

21:31 What this has to do with data centers

26:36 How does a company earn a community's trust?

29:30 Listen more than you talk, and ask about allergies

34:11 What the red dot taught her

Links:

Ana Tardio's TEDxAtlanta talk, “From Cocido to BBQ. What Food Taught Me About Empathy”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ds6hQXVpUCs

Ana Tardio's TEDxAtlanta speaker page: https://www.tedxatlanta.com/ana-tardio/

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe!

For more information, go to https://www.QTSDataCenters.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

Former Ranger Regiment psychologist Jeremy Noble is the stranger on a plane who talked me through a racing heart. He swears by the good guy factor, and joins a couple of our crew, Greg Wuestner and Jeff Sangillo, two veterans, to talk leaving the military and asking for help.

Chapters

00:00 A stranger on a plane: "Hey, how's the heart?"

06:24 Greg Wuestner: from Army infantry to QTS through SkillBridge

08:09 Jeff Sangillo: from Navy nuclear propulsion to the QTS energy team

10:00 What nobody tells you about leaving the military

11:10 207 hours walked at West Point

16:08 Autonomy, mastery and belonging: what disappears overnight

24:12 Googling "what is a data center?"

29:30 When a mistake can cost a life

33:11 Picking the right people first

35:54 Psychological safety: more mistakes, or more honesty?

42:18 Why asking for help is the hardest part

46:10 Nobody calls a torn ACL weak

52:20 The sergeant major who stopped in the rain

57:02 What people need to flourish

1:02:46 What a veterans group can do for new vets

1:15:33 If you feel cut off from your team

1:21:52 Parting words: ask for help, and be a good dude

Links

Jeremy Noble: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremy-noble-phd-abpp-b93a7617a/

Noble Organizational Consulting: https://www.psychology.consulting/home

Greg Wuestner: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregory-wuestner/

Jeff Sangillo: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffsangillo/

QTS Data Centers: https://qtsdatacenters.com

Dan Ferriter: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danferriter/

Darrian Winston: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darrian-winston/

"Why You Should Hire a Ranger," Jeremy Noble: https://www.psychology.consulting/post/why-you-should-hire-a-ranger

More articles from Jeremy Noble: https://www.psychology.consulting/blog

Amy Edmondson, "Learning from Mistakes Is Easier Said Than Done" (1996): https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0021886396321001

DoD SkillBridge: https://skillbridge.osd.mil/

VA/DoD Clinical Practice Guideline on Suicide Risk (2024 synopsis): https://scholar.usuhs.edu/en/publications/assessment-and-management-of-patients-at-risk-for-suicide-synopsi/

Also mentioned: self-determination theory (Ryan and Deci), Good to Great by Jim Collins, The Assessment of Men (OSS)

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe!

For more information, go to https://www.Q.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

Henrico turned people away from White Oak for years — the crypto guys, companies waving billions. Anthony Romanello had a hand in most of those calls, and he retired from Henrico in January, so he can finally tell me how they made them. Turns out the community was vetting us the whole time.

Chapters:

00:00:06 Chapter Two After 34 Years

00:08:56 Frito-Lay Chips, Not Semiconductors: How White Oak Happened

00:11:57 When the Conversation Turned Political

00:14:58 The Landscape Changed and Nobody Explained Why

00:17:47 Communities See What You Say Yes To

00:20:19 Fencing Off the Revenue for Affordable Housing

00:25:13 Why Henrico Added a Conditional Use Permit

00:27:59 The Photo on His Phone

00:32:05 Stop Talking and Listen

00:41:41 Who's Actually Paying for the Power

00:52:50 Half the Calls, People Need a Neighbor

Links and References:

Anthony Romanello — LinkedIn — linkedin.com/in/anthony-romanello-510723157

S.I.R. — Richmond — sirhq.com

Henrico Economic Development Authority — henrico.com

DE-CIX Richmond — de-cix.net

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe!

For more information, go to https://www.Q.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

José Luis Friebel got into data centers by accident — second job interview in London, start tomorrow, we've got a conference in six months. Best accident of his life, he says. He told me the thing slowing this whole build-out down isn't power. It's plumbers. I did not expect that.

00:00:00  From a sunny coastal town in Spain to the global data center business

00:07:13  Why an industry that built the cloud still doesn't talk to itself

00:12:08  The panel where somebody says "you're full of crap" — and nobody's offended

00:17:03  The human capital crunch, and the unsung heroes of modern civilization

00:19:57  Scholarships, electricians and plumbers: not charity, industry survival

00:29:26  What communities actually say when you ask them

00:34:11  Water, energy, and what it takes to be a good neighbor

00:38:50  Why the industry got caught by surprise on transparency

00:43:55  AI as infrastructure, and 90 billion in Aragon

00:48:16  Radiologists, drones, and why AI creates more jobs than it destroys

00:54:41  AI cities, and the jobs question: direct, indirect, and induced

01:02:22  "You're not an island, you're a peninsula"

01:04:49  What José wants you to remember

José Luis Friebel: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jose-luis-friebel-dcd/

InfraXmedia: https://www.infraxmedia.com/

DatacenterDynamics: https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/

AI Cities Summit Europe 2027: https://www.aicitysummit.com/europe/2027

AI Cities Summit launch: https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/marketwatch/infraxmedia-launches-ai-cities-summit-series-to-support-governments-navigating-ai-infrastructure-growth/

SPAINDC (Spanish Data Center Association): https://spaindc.com/

MEXDC (Mexican Data Center Association): https://asmexdc.com/

Infrastructure Masons: https://imasons.org/

Lays Rodrigues: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lays-rodrigues/

George Rockett: https://www.linkedin.com/in/george-rockett-b18a3b4/

Dan Loosemore: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-loosemore-marketing-specialist/

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe! For more information, go to https://www.Q.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

Jake Dukes runs programs at Zac Brown's camp for veterans and kids. Years ago he came to me and said he didn't want to talk about money or sponsorship — he wanted us to show up. I stayed till one in the morning. Their chef is also unreasonably good.

Chapters

00:00:06 Pastor, camp, and a friendship that started on a beach

00:04:29 The mission: find what makes a person unique, then magnify it

00:07:30 What a data center has to do with a camp in Georgia

00:12:22 Warrior Week, Warrior Path, and the invisible wounds of war

00:16:56 A lumpy first eighteen months, and the go/no-go stations

00:21:23 Why trust is the hardest thing to rebuild

00:26:31 Don’t scrap who you were — reforging instead of starting over

00:35:39 What the week is actually for: making one real friend

00:39:41 Zac Brown’s heart for veterans and at-risk kids

00:42:07 Who pays for it: 93% of the kids are on scholarship

00:43:35 The light in the eyes, and a cucumber that tasted like a Kit Kat

00:45:50 Why kids and veterans belong in the same place, and what neurodiversity means

00:50:28 What a hiring manager should know about the veteran across the desk

01:06:48 Twenty years of building in communities, hiring from them, and being welcomed

01:09:30 How to tell whether a company that says it hires vets actually does

01:20:52 “I don’t want to talk to you about money”

Links & References:

Camp Southern Ground: https://campsouthernground.org/

Camp Southern Ground staff: https://campsouthernground.org/staff/

Jake Dukes, Vice President, Strategic Initiatives: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jachindukes/

Mike Caimona, incoming CEO: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mbcaimona/

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe! For more information, go to https://www.Q.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

When James told me the best early warning for a job-site injury isn’t a safety number, I said what you’re probably thinking — that’s ridiculous, and how would you even measure it? What came next changed how I look at it. Come find out what the number is.

Chapters:

00:00:00 A Gaelic footballer walks into a data-center podcast

00:02:07 Culture as bedrock: measure the inputs, not the score

00:05:30 Scaling culture when you’re hiring thousands

00:06:34 What PepTalk does: feedback from the field, and morale as a leading indicator

00:11:57 The blind spot: why the once-a-year survey misses it

00:16:18 The data: low-morale stretches vs. high-incident stretches

00:19:43 People leave unsafe sites: retention as the early warning

00:36:14 Construction vs. operations: human error and reinforcement

00:40:19 Staying alert in a “fully operational Death Star”

00:45:39 Reading the site like a body: must-have or nice-to-have?

00:51:11 Measuring the truth, and the one big takeaway

Links / References

James Brogan (guest) — LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesbrogan1/

Bernard Brogan (co-founder) — LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bernardbrogan/

PepTalk — website: https://www.peptalk.com

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe!

For more information, go to https://www.Q.com

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]

Rob Hopewell’s been in data centers so long I keep accusing him of starting at 11 — UUNET, EdgeConneX, now running QTS sales. We get into why this AI moment isn’t the dot-com bust, why the phone in your hand is a data center, and how our industry can finally explain itself.

Chapters:

0:00  From UUNET to now — the early internet, peering, MAE East/West

5:44  “Unprecedented” — solving first-time problems (spiky AI load, the utility)

7:47  Selling power, not square feet — the model that changed the industry

11:48  A day in the life running QTS sales — deals at the C-level

14:16  What the dot-com bust taught him — strategy, relationships, hustle

15:29  The 2016 hyperscale pivot — the Freedom Design and the availability zones

19:04  “Plan B: make plan A work” — the first deal, and Blackstone

24:09  EdgeConneX and what “the edge” really is

30:37  Building speculatively — the formula that won Atlanta

36:04  The messaging problem — what a data center actually is

40:09  Why AI isn’t a bubble (and meeting OpenAI in 2017)

45:08  “One throat to choke,” building sales talent, and the takeaway: culture

Links:

Rob Hopewell on LinkedIn: [https://www.linkedin.com/in/robhopewell/]

QTS Data Centers: Q.com

Thank you for visiting our channel, be sure to Like, Comment, and Subscribe! 

Learn More about QTS Data Centers on the QTS YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/users/qtsdatacenters

Think you have a great topic for a podcast or would like to schedule an interview with Dave? Send in your requests to [email protected]