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Viyas Sundaram is CEO of Cincinnati-based construction estimating software provider STACK Construction Technologies. The opinions are the author’s own.
Data centers have been causing quite a stir in recent months, with high plans to build hundreds of buildings at national level. For construction workers, this investment boom has been both a blessing and a curse.
On the one hand, this means there is more urgent demand for construction projects, with the immediacy fueling offers of high wages, bonuses, paid time off and stable work. This is a saving grace, as with today’s high mortgage rates and weaker housing demand, residential construction has cooled drops significantly.
With data centers, the pay is higher and the potential for overtime still exists, making the projects attractive to entry-level workers and industry veterans alike.
However, as the demand for data centers continues to increase, there are only so many skilled workers today that can meet this need.
Via Sundaram
Permission granted by STACK
The irony is that workers with these skills who have been in the field for decades are often reluctant to integrate artificial intelligence into their workflows, which would otherwise help speed up manual tasks. This means that much of the work is still done with pencil and paper, leading to longer, unpaid hours and often less accurate estimates and take-offs in pre-construction.
According to the Financial Times, this is expected 40% of data centers originally scheduled to be completed in 2026 will face construction delays.
Humans aren’t designed to keep up with this relentless demand, but industry is resistant to digital tools that could speed up the work. So what comes next?
Why is there resistance?
The shortage of trade workers caused disruptions during the construction of more than half of the data centers last year, the Wall Street Journal reported. Integrating existing technology into workflows could alleviate these problems, or at least reduce their number, but workers default to what’s proven and familiar, especially when deadlines are tight and the cost of a mistake is high.
But AI is no longer just a “tech person” tool, it’s a benchmark changer, just as the Internet was. There is no longer a choice as to whether you will have to learn how to use AI, no matter what industry you are in. There’s too much at stake in terms of profits and productivity, so you can’t afford to run against this technology, risking being left behind by other professionals willing to adapt.
How can we see the change
This conversation starts with leadership. That means taking a bigger role in communicating the benefits of AI integration to teams and implementing ways to familiarize workers with these new programs. Job site personnel must learn how it works before they are on a project and catch up in real time.
They are skilled and hard workers who have built their career and credibility in the field over many years. It’s an ego hit to have to accept that the construction landscape is changing, an industry they’ve become accustomed to navigating day in and day out. However, their experience in the workplace is exactly what makes them better equipped than anyone else to evaluate and deploy these tools.
Creating safe spaces for these workers to learn and be exposed to seamless and user-friendly technology will be essential to promoting adoption.
Building capabilities with AI
Construction workers have always been closest to the job site, and that proximity is exactly what makes them the most valuable users of AI-powered tools. With access to AI-embedded software, workers can cross-reference the reference design with real-world constraints before a single nail is driven or brick is placed.
Consider a practical example: A contractor reviewing plans for a data center can now identify that a mechanical room’s square footage doesn’t align with cooling requirements before it becomes a costly change order. This is more than an efficiency gain: it is a change in project knowledge.
In the next five years, construction workers will not only execute plans, but combine decades of on-the-ground experience with technology to co-author them. This is not a threat to trade, it is an upliftment.
Eventually, the data center boom will burst
Given how nascent data center construction plans are, there is no set timeline for when they should be broadly completed. That means the opportunity will run out for construction workers taking advantage of the urgency, but we don’t know exactly when.
When this happens, it is hoped that these projects and the urgent demand will have taught the industry a valuable lesson. We can no longer rely on long construction timelines and delayed projects. The current tightening of margins, between rising material costs and living in an increasingly on-demand world that requires more infrastructure, means this level of construction pressure will continue.
Instead of having to scramble when the next data center arrives, contractors will have integrated digital tools into their systems to be ready to handle more projects with fewer workers. They’ll also have given their teams time to learn these tools and become comfortable using them, eliminating the learning curve and potential pushback to sticking with antiquated methods.
Just because the construction industry has been around for a long time doesn’t mean it isn’t capable of evolving. The data center boom isn’t just demanding more buildings, it’s demanding more from those who build them.
