A one-month delay on a typical 60 MW data centre in the US can cost a developer up to USD 14.2 million in lost revenue, cost overruns and contractual penalties, according to modelling by STL Partners. In the same indicative scenario, the project’s internal rate of return falls from 17.1% to 15.5% after one month and to 12.6% after three.
Most conversations about delay centre on power availability, equipment lead times and permitting. Hiring tends to get less attention, even though every schedule depends on people being in place when the work starts. Uptime Institute’s 2025 global survey of more than 800 data centre owners and operators found that nearly two-thirds report difficulty retaining staff, finding qualified candidates, or both. Colt Data Centre Services has said that delays to major projects are increasingly caused by shortages of MEP trades and commissioning personnel. Uptime’s Executive Director of Research, Andy Lawrence, added that for the first time more operators find it harder to recruit and retain senior people than those earlier in their careers.
In a market this tight, the way an employer approaches data centre recruitment has a direct effect on the programme. A role that sits open while a hiring team holds out for an ideal profile carries a cost, and that cost builds in the same place as every other delay.
Why the specification is often where the wait begins
Research from Harvard Business School and Accenture, drawing on surveys of 8,720 workers and 2,275 executives in the US, UK and Germany, found that most employers acknowledged their hiring systems rejected potentially productive applicants. The authors noted that this leaves employers holding positions open for longer or choosing from a smaller pool. The study covered employers across sectors and dates from 2021, but the principle carries over. A requirement for hyperscale experience, or for a particular vendor platform, can screen out an engineer from a power or industrial background who would be effective on site within weeks. Colt makes a related point about recruiting from adjacent industries, noting that sectors such as aerospace and the military offer engineering and operational foundations that translate well into data centre roles.
How a long interview process adds to the wait
In Totaljobs’ 2025 survey of 748 HR leaders and 2,025 jobseekers in the UK, 28% of candidates said they had dropped out of a hiring process. Among those candidates, 28% cited a better offer and 25% said the process took too long. The two reasons are probably connected, because the longer a process runs, the more time a candidate has to hear from someone else. The same survey found that 36% of recruiters said their company had too many interview stages. It covered the UK market across sectors, so it describes hiring behaviour in general. With nearly two-thirds of data centre operators reporting difficulty hiring, an experienced candidate may well be talking to several employers at once.
Separating genuine non-negotiables from skills that can be learned
None of this argues for lowering standards where they matter. Safety competence and project-specific certifications can be genuine non-negotiables, and speed alone is a poor measure of a good hire. The Harvard researchers point out that employers often judge hiring on the time and cost of filling a role, when how quickly new employees get up to speed and how long they stay say more about whether it worked. The useful question for a hiring manager is which requirements are essential to do the job on day one and which a capable engineer can pick up on the project.
A few practical choices follow from that. Agreeing the essential requirements with the project lead before a search starts keeps the specification anchored to the programme. Interview stages earn their place when they change the decision, and recruiters in the Totaljobs survey suggested no more than two rounds in smaller businesses and three in larger ones. Those same recruiters named hiring manager availability among the factors slowing decisions, so interview and feedback time can be held in diaries before a shortlist arrives.
Data centre projects are planned to the week, with milestones for power and equipment. Hiring plans can be held to the same standard, with a date by which each critical role needs to be filled and a decision timeline the project team can rely on. At Thor, we recruit exclusively in data centres, and we treat the hiring plan as part of the build programme.
Planning critical hires for an upcoming build? Speak to our data centre recruitment team.
